Now that all the hype has died down and all regulatory permissions appropriated, some tough questions still linger much as no one is talking about them. Many said Google was buying Motorola Mobility for its patent stash and this was reasonably accurate, as the company has some 17,000 patents on the purchasing block.

Many see this as a strategic move by Google to protect its Android operating system from cannibalism by patent trolls the moment it hit critical mass. All this is great but there remains one little overlooked detail: Motorola Mobility is a fully functional multinational company with over 25,000 employees working in 92 factories across over 90 countries.

Now, Google did not just buy the patents, it bought everything that comes with the company, including these employees. So what happens to these employees now that Google has its patents and Android is safe? Unlike the case of Nortel where the company was broken apart and the properties auctioned, MM is a different case altogether, and the lack of focus and commitment on Google’s part is rather shocking.

Google is now stuck with a $12.5 billion toy that it does not quite know what to do with. Remember Google is an Internet company; it knows nothing about running factories and manufacturing, so this leaves MM in a precarious position. In addition, with all the emphasis Google is laying on chasing down Facebook to the death, how can anyone realistically expect the company to concentrate on the huge responsibility it accepted on a whim?

SOURCE: Venture Beat