EXCLUSIVE: Google has slashed more jobs at their Motorola Mobility Australian operation with the sudden dumping of long time CEO Timo Brouwer.Speaking to ChannelNews this week Brouwer said “There has been a big culling of staff in Australia, I cannot talk about it because I am under a non-disclosure agreement”.
In February National Sales Manager and former HTC executive Anthony Petts left the US Company to join Telstra.
ChannelNews understands that several other senior Motorola Mobility Australia executives have been dumped ahead of the launch in July of a brand new Google developed smartphone. Former Marketing Manager at Motorola Mobility Australia Barry Smyth is now working in the USA on the launch of the new smartphone.
ChannelNews has been told that Google Australia staff is now “managing the launch of the new Google X smartphone”.
This device which was originally set to run the new Android 5.0 Key Lime Pie is now tipped be launched with the all new Android 6.0 Milkshake.
Hugh Bradlow the head of Research at Telstra is believed to have told colleagues that the new Google offering is a “game changer” after being shown a prototype of the device at the 2013 CES show.
The hardware is designed a 4.6-inch flexible IPS OLED display the casing is made from a semi-flexible material.
Standard features include a 10-megapixel rear-facing camera, a 2-megapixel front-facing camera, NFC, GPS, HDMI out socket and, wireless charging.
Overnight a US Judge took a pot shot at both Apple and Motorola claiming that the two who are at war over patents have “no interest in efficiently and expeditiously resolving this dispute.”
US District Judge Robert Scola sitting in Florida said “They are instead using this and similar litigation worldwide as a business strategy that appears to have no end”.
The case includes over 180 claims connected to 12 patents, and the two parties are even contesting the meaning of over 100 terms.
Scola complains that the two sides haven’t streamlined the case on their own, calling it “obstreperous and cantankerous” behaviour. “Without hints of irony, the parties now ask the court to mop up a mess they made by holding a hearing to reduce the size and complexity of the case,” he elaborates.
The companies now have four months to narrow the scope of the case. If they don’t, Scola threatens, the case will be put on hold until all the conflicts over patent terms are resolved. Apple has yet to respond, and a Google spokesman has refused to comment.
Critics have argued that major smartphone makers, particularly Apple, have turned to lawsuits as a way of protecting market share. Former Apple CEO Steve Jobs infamously called Google’s Android platform “stolen,” and said he was willing to go to “thermonuclear war” over the matter. Since then, lawsuits have become common amongst smartphone makers, even without Apple’s.
