Google Bids Goodbye To The Smartphone Business With $2.9 Billion Motorola Sale

For all its commitment to the Android ecosystem, Google’s big play in the smartphone market is over with its $2.9 billion sale of Motorola Mobility to Lenovo. That’s a major drop from the $12.5 billion it paid to buy the Santa Clara, Calif-based company in 2011, which brought with it a tranche of patents, talented engineers and insights into the mobile space — and it helps cover the $3.2 billion that Google paid for Nest, the maker of the learning thermostat earlier this month. (Google’s M&A team have certainly had a busy start to 2014.)