When ginormous companies try to buy gigantic companies, there’s always cries about monopolies, anti-trustiness and all those nasty words. So it’s really no surprise that the Department of Justice is now making a “second request” for more information about Google swallowing Motorola.
Google, to their credit, is still confident that the deal will still go through, saying:
While this means we won’t be closing right away, we’re confident that the DOJ will conclude that the rapidly growing mobile ecosystem will remain highly competitive after this deal closes. We’ll be working closely and cooperatively with them as they continue their review.
But that’s what they’re supposed to say! The WSJ reports that the DOJ isn’t saying that they’ll block the deal but rather there are antitrust issues that are worth a second look. $US12.5 billion dollars, Google making Android and Motorola making Android phones, yeah it all seems like fair grounds to ask for more information. We’ll see what comes out of this closer look in time. [Google Public Policy Blog via WSJ]