Google chairman Eric Schmidt said Tuesday that the Internet giant’s purchase of Motorola Mobility would not affect partnerships with other handset makers, including Samsung Electronics.
“We will run (Motorola) sufficiently and independently in a way that will not violate Android’s openness. We are not going to change in any material way the way we operate,” Schmidt said at a press conference on a visit to Seoul.
The comment came when he was asked about the closed conversations with Samsung executives in the previous night in Seoul. He declined to reveal the details.
Google in August agreed to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion in its largest acquisition.
He made it clear that Google has no plan to receive a licensing fee from Android partners, emphasizing the openness of Android mobile software and the mobile ecosystem in general.
Schmidt would not comment on the biography of Steve Jobs, in which the Apple co-founder claimed Google stole innovations from iPhone.
“I’m still very sad and recovering from the sense of loss,” he said. The two were close friends for more than 20 years.
But he also defended Google, saying “Most people would agree in general that Google is a great innovator. And Google’s Android efforts started before the iPhone efforts.”
This is the second time the owner of the world’s most popular search engine and mobile platform has visited Korea since 2007. And his super-busy schedule for the two-day visit reflected the drastic change in Google’s status over the past years.
In a meeting with President Lee Myung-bak, Schmidt pledged to support the globalization of Korean software and content, especially K-pop, via its popular video sharing platform YouTube starting next year.
Google also plans to provide game applications as a separate channel in the Android market in Korea while supporting and training local business startups in the field.
Involving its widely-talked acquisition of Daum Communications, the country’s No. 2 portal, Schmidt said on Monday, “We can’t talk about any acquisitions.”
By Lee Ji-yoon (
jylee@heraldcorp.com)
