Google Acquires Fitbit for $2.1 Billion, Made by Google Wearables Coming?

Reports of Google looking to larn popular wear company Fitbit made their way to the Internet before this week. Well, the rumors accept been proven truthful. Google has today taken to its official blog to confirm the conquering of Fitbit, a motility which it states will exist helpful in furthering the Wearable OS, also equally Made by Google hardware ecosystem.

The official press release states, "Fitbit, Inc. has entered into a definitive understanding to be acquired past Google LLC for $7.35 per share in cash." This means the wearable maker has been valued at approximately $two.ane billion in this deal, which is higher than its current $ane.86 billion market capital (share toll: $7.20). The transaction is said to exist closed next year in 2020.

James Park, the co-founder and CEO of Fitbit comments on the acquisition, "Google is an platonic partner to advance our mission. With Google'south resources and global platform, Fitbit will be able to accelerate innovation in the wearables category, calibration faster, and make health even more accessible to anybody."

Fitbit'due south squad volition at present join Google and most likely expand on Wear OS with Pebble's software squad (which Fitbit acquired last year) while also pivoting its Versa smartwatch into a 'Made by Google' product. The wearable maker, in its printing release, adds that information technology's going to remain platform doubter (work both with Android and iOS) and preserve user security, too as privacy.

"This agreement underscores our belief in how important wearable tech has go, and it's as well an exciting opportunity for Vesture Os. We're looking forward to collaborating with Fitbit to bring the best of our smartwatch platforms and health applications together and enabling our partners to build the adjacent generation of wearables," says Google's Wear OS Production Manager, Sameer Samat in the web log post.

Even earlier today's confirmation, Google'south motility to acquire Fitbit has been mocked by many. It's being referred equally "a way for Google to build a Pixel Watch" and then shutter Fitbit – like information technology has done several brands and products over the by few years.

One of the all-time examples of Google's brusk-lived aspirations has to exist the acquisition of "Motorola Mobility," which didn't turn out to be as fruitful as the search giant might have expected. I think we all know what happened with that. Motorola was bought past Google some fourth dimension in 2012 and sold off to Lenovo in 2014 for $2.91 billion, a fraction of the sum that was paid (around $12.five billion) to acquire information technology.

We're non trying to undermine Google'south power to build hardware, but we sort of are. Nosotros sure are excited to see what Fitbit brings to the tabular array – a smart article of clothing, controlled by Google Assistant, and providing wellness-focused features on par with the Apple Sentry. I mean, if Google wants the much-rumored Pixel Sentry to exist a success, so it has to become the recipe (almost) right in the first go.

Source: https://beebom.com/google-acquires-fitbit/

Posted by: gistablity.blogspot.com

Share this post