More Details on Nokia's Latest Complaints Against Apple Surface

[cmaier]

Apple would never attempt a takeover of Nokia, That would be a terrible decision. Their shareholders would go ballistic. I'm talking about real shareholders not some fanboys with a couple thousand in stock that surf MR and blindly worship everything Apple does.

Like I said, it won't happen. I was just disputing the idea that Apple couldn't do it because it was too small. Apple has more capitalization and more cash than Nokia. It won't happen because Apple would have nothing to gain by doing it - it can make the lawsuit go away much cheaper than that, and Nokia offers nothing of value to Apple.

 

[seedster2]

It's only making Nokia look bad among Apple-Fanboys and Apple-Apologists.

Fact is, Nokia has patents that Apple isn't paying for. Nokia has a right to be paid for them, whether they're struggling or not (or struggling more/less than the global economy in general). Dismissing it as "Nokia is just hard up for cash and patent trolling" is, frankly, stupid. It shows that the speaker is just a fanboy with a worthless opinion.

Neither Apple nor Nokia has said that this is a recent issue (ie. since the iPhone's continued dominating success). It's been clearly stated these negotiations go back to the very beginning, when it was just an early success (or possibly even before it was fully released). Nokia was doing well, the iPhone wasn't yet sure to be a long term, cross-market success. This isn't about sour grapes, and anyone with functional brain cells knows that.

The underlying snag appears to be "Nokia wants a patent sharing agreement, Apple doesn't; without that, Nokia wants more money than Apple wants to pay". It's NOT clear whether or not Nokia wants MORE than the fair/non-discriminatory price. Just that they want more than Apple is willing to pay. Apple isn't contesting that they're using Nokia patents, nor that they own Nokia _some_ amount of money, so stop painting this as "Nokia has nothing". They have something, or Apple's replies wouldn't be "they're asking for too much". They would, instead, be "nokia's patents are bogus" or "nokia has no such patents" or "nokia is just harassing us and patent trolling" or "see, this is what's wrong with the patent system".

Everyone who is not a fanboy nor apologist (for one side or the other) recognizes that this is a real case with actual merits (possibly on both sides), and it's not yet clear who has more merit, and who is going to win. Further, they know that there are no white hats nor black hats here, just two equally grey hats, each with self interests and trying to pressure the other side to bend to their individual (and selfish) will.

Which is a long winded way of saying: until you fanboys are ready to stop viewing the world through your heavily tinted glasses, the only people who "look bad allover" are you.

So true. There is no way to determine with absolute certainty that Nokia's suit is baseless. Apple and Nokia may both be guilty of some wrongdoing here.

 

[aegisdesign]

Like I said, it won't happen. I was just disputing the idea that Apple couldn't do it because it was too small. Apple has more capitalization and more cash than Nokia. It won't happen because Apple would have nothing to gain by doing it - it can make the lawsuit go away much cheaper than that, and Nokia offers nothing of value to Apple.

Somewhat hyperbolic perhaps although probably not worth buying the whole of Nokia for the bits Apple might want that don't overlap with their own offerings or that they aren't interested in.

Imagine how badly Nokia-Siemens Networks would do if Apple ran it. It's been bad enough with the Siemens guys still there.

Anyway, just a point though. If Apple wanted to resolve this for the least amount of money, they'd have paid Nokia in the first place. It's obviously not about money.

 

[sjo]

Like I said, it won't happen. I was just disputing the idea that Apple couldn't do it because it was too small. Apple has more capitalization and more cash than Nokia. It won't happen because Apple would have nothing to gain by doing it - it can make the lawsuit go away much cheaper than that, and Nokia offers nothing of value to Apple.

In practice, Apple can't do it because they're too small. The price they'd need to pay is far higher than the current market cap. On the other hand attempting hostile takeover would do havoc on Apple's market cap.

Not long ago Microsoft tried to takeover yahoo. The numbers were even more favorable for MSFT in that case. Did not succeed. 200B company was unsuccessful in taking over 20B company. 200B company will have difficult times taking over 50B company. If that's attempted is hostile manner. Friendly takeover might be in cards though. Would it make sense is another question.

For obtaining patent portfolio on the standardized GMS, UMTS and WiFi technology, Motorola would make much more sense. The Google phone is destroying the last hope of the handset division and the Mot stock owners would probably be happy to make a deal with Apple...

 

[kzin]

The Google phone is destroying the last hope of the (Motorola) handset division

Unless the "Nexus Two" is going to be a Motorola phone.

One of the little blurbs I read yesterday said something about this being the "first" of a portfolio of Android super-phones. That _hints_ at there being more in the works. Given Google's intentions in founding the OHA in the first place, it wouldn't make sense to give all of those eggs to one handset maker. So, it could be that we'll see a Nexus Two and/or Three, perhaps within a few months, and they'll come from one or two other OHA members. (my own personal hope for the correct interpretation of the blurb being "there are plans for a Nexus Two and/or Three" is: hopefully there's still a chance we'll see a new 5 row qwerty Android phone, a worthy successor to the G1 ... and/or a 4.1" screen Android phone (preferably one phone with both of those characteristics) ... but, my own personal hope doesn't have any care/concern for it being a Motorola phone, in fact, I'd kind of like to see an Android phone based on the HTC Touch Pro 2, with a 4.1" 854x480 screen, and styled a little more like the Nexus One, and with the Nexus One's internal features ... that would be MUCH more interesting to me than a Motorola Nexus Two).

Of course, we the public wont know if that's what is or isn't going to happen for a little while. The question is more "what does Motorola know". If the deal is already in the works, then they know their last hope isn't being destroyed by the Nexus One ... and they're not likely to make a move of desperation (allowing themselves to be sold to Apple). On the other hand, even if it is Google's plan, but they haven't inked a deal with Motorola yet, then Motorola may think their last hopes are being dashed ... even if they're not ... and may make an un-necessary sale to Apple. Or, what if Google has no such intention, but Moto thinks they do? Again, not likely to make a friendly sale to Apple. (the fourth case being: Google has no intention of doing that, and Moto knows that, or assumes that ... in which case, it's back to "might make the friendly take-over deal with Apple").

The other possible hope Motorola might have is: The Nexus One is "owned by Google, but made for them by HTC". Right now, there's only a T-Mobile version, with an announcement that there will be Verizon version. What if the Verizon version is "owned by Google, but made for them by Motorola?" That would also seem to fit Google's plans/intentions within the OHA. That re-runs the above set of scenarios, only it's based on variations of the Nexus One, instead of a hypothetical Nexus Two.

But, yeah, Motorola makes much more sense as an acquisition target for Apple, than Nokia.

 

[sjo]

Unless the "Nexus Two" is going to be a Motorola phone.

...
The other possible hope Motorola might have is: The Nexus One is "owned by Google, but made for them by HTC".

Neither of those alternatives is exactly positive news for Motorola. So Google could be shopping around and makes the best offer they find official Google phone, say every quarter or half a year. The manufacturer is first subjected to competitive pricing pressures and then sells 1-2m of those phones during the quarter which it takes for them to ramp up the production (ie, only able to supply a very limited number of carriers) and then during another quarter they sell 2-5m more, except that the new google phone has been announced and they need to push the price of the old model further down. That's 0-profit game at best.

And in the second alternative they have been reduced into a contract manufacturer and are basically competing with kinds of Foxconn. Without the competitive advantages Foxconn has.