said by jgkolt:First and foremost this is for patents.
I would agree this is purely about patents and I think its goofy that to avoid stupid patent infringement cases paying 12.5 Billion makes sense. Time for the patent office to go as I'm very much a supporter of patent protection of an expression of an idea, but patent protection of a very vague idea is just wrong.
I'd bet that Google has already explained the purpose of the acquisition to other hardware vendors.
Look for other acquisitions for this purpose in the never ending patent arms race (seriously stupid).
Blake