5 years ago today, Google acquired Android Inc. | Hacker News Reader

5 years ago today, Google acquired Android Inc.

businessweek.com

55 pointsthere24 comments

Interesting anecdote about the Android acquisition: Larry and Sergey bought the company without telling Eric Schmidt about it[1]. Google moved into the mobile market on a whim.

Google's strategy seem a lot more planned and methodical from the outside.

[1] From a Schmidt press conference last year: "Android purchase, he didn’t even notice Larry and Sergey bought it." - http://searchengineland.com/live-blogging-sergey-brin-eric-s...

For some reason, that doesn't really surprise me. I mean, GMail was basically a whim, and I kinda got that same feeling when Wave came out. The Android acquisition could just be considered like a 20% project, but scaled to the CEO level.

That might just be the kind of thing you have to say when your on the board of a rival smartphone manufacturer at the time your company starts planning a rival.

Apple wasn't yet a smartphone maker at the time of the Android purchase (this was 2005, the iPhone didn't come out until 2007).

Doesn't seem like it was that long ago. Interesting that over time people started to believe Google itself created Android, when it's actually closer to being a hiptop successor.

What does it mean for "Google itself" to have created Android? The product they acquired was fairly different from what's out there today. To me, this is a good example of a very successful talent acquisition.

More evolved? Yes. Using a different monetization strategy? Yes.

But different? I don't think so. The technological foundation of Android (linux for the kernel, small C library and functionality-rich runtime for a custom VM supporting Java-ish programming language) is the same today as it was 5 years ago and is just an evolution of what Sidekick did in 2002. Sure, they made lots of technical progress, added bunch of APIs, polished the UI, changed the business model, but technology is the same, just improved (like you would expect after 5 years).

Think of what Microsoft had had at hand when they acquired Danger/Sidekick, and where they would be today if they didn't decide to rewrite the whole thing.

Rewrites of religion motivated or language motivated don't end up well often. Luckily Google didn't decide to rewrite Android just because some people don't like Java.

But they like Java.

kjksf summed it up nicely. Google obviously provided a ton of capital but it was Rubin, using what he learned when building the hiptop, that gave the spark to the whole project.

That's not surprising, considering that "Android has operated under a cloak of secrecy".

Tyrell Corporation created the Androids. Everybody knows that.

I think this is the only acquisition they have made that makes sense in retrospect.

Google Maps and Google Earth were great acquisitions.

Forgot about those. Don't know if Earth added anything of value but Maps, certainly. Still not a great track record overall, though.

All it takes is a few out of the many!

I think I saw a video on YouTube saying otherwise. But I may be wrong.

Is that the one that said it was finally cash flow positive after half a decade? http://www.webtvwire.com/analysts-claim-youtube-on-course-fo...

Nope. I think it was the one explaining that YouTube is the world's second largest search engine as well as first search choice for an entire generation or something along these lines. But I'm not sure cause I only read between the lines.

Understood. Well, with that in mind, I guess the bottom line never matters...just what's in between.

The bottom line only matters in the long run or if you are seriously short on cash. There is nothing inherently bad or wrong about running a department at a loss for a few years if you have the cash flow to cover it and doing so gives you a long term strategic advantage.

Agreed.

Totlol is a great site idea, by the way. Gonna visit with my kiddies, nice work.

I would say Pyra (Blogger), Picasa, Keyhole (Google Earth), Urchin / Measure Map (Google Analytics), YouTube, DoubleClick, FeedBurner and Grand Central / gizmo5 (Google Voice) have all worked out nicely in retrospect. Others in progress like ITA and AdMob should also be wins.

A lot of their smaller buys were for staff, so it's much harder to say if those panned out.

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