9to5Google: Beyond Good and Evil

Sprint today confirmed in a press release that it will acquire the roughly 50 percent of Clearwire it doesn’t already own, giving it 100 percent ownership of the company in deal worth $2.2 billion:

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. & BELLEVUE, Wash. (BUSINESS WIRE), December 17, 2012 – Sprint (NYSE:S) today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the approximately 50 percent stake in Clearwire (NASDAQ: CLWR) it does not currently own for $2.97 per share, equating to a total payment to Clearwire shareholders, other than Sprint, of $2.2 billion. This transaction results in a total Clearwire enterprise value of approximately $10 billion, including net debt and spectrum lease obligations of $5.5 billion.

The transaction will take place for $2.2 billion paid to Clearwire’s shareholders (other than Sprint), or $2.97 per share. Sprint explained it is a “128 percent premium to Clearwire’s closing share price the day before the Sprint-SoftBank discussions were first confirmed.” Sprint also said the spectrum acquired from Clearwire, in combination with its own, will provide “an enhanced spectrum portfolio that will strengthen its position and increase competitiveness in the U.S. wireless industry.” As noted in the release, Softbank, which is currently slated to take control of Sprint in mid-2013, gave its consent to the Clearwire deal as required:

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The New York Times and Wall Street Journal reported this evening that the long antitrust probe/suit/investigation into Google by the Federal Trade Commission is ending after nearly two years. The debacle, centered on antitrust litigation and allegations, is said to end with Google coming out relatively unaffected—something competitors like Yahoo certainly do not want. The FTC is said to end the investigation as early as this week, with Google agreeing to make changes to satisfy the organization. The changes are not yet clear. We can only wonder if CEO Larry Page’s meeting helped push things in Google’s direction. You bet we’ll update as more develops.
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Entertaining discussion. Especially Google chairman Eric Schmidt’s comment at 23:15.

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Beyond interesting development:

Ray Kurzweil confirmed today that he will be joining Google to work on new projects involving machine learning and language processing.

“I’m excited to share that I’ll be joining Google as Director of Engineering this Monday, December 17,” said Kurzweil.

“I’ve been interested in technology, and machine learning in particular, for a long time: when I was 14, I designed software that wrote original music, and later went on to invent the first print-to-speech reading machine for the blind, among other inventions. I’ve always worked to create practical systems that will make a difference in people’s lives, which is what excites me as an inventor.

“In 1999, I said that in about a decade we would see technologies such as self-driving cars and mobile phones that could answer your questions, and people criticized these predictions as unrealistic. Fast forward a decade — Google has demonstrated self-driving cars, and people are indeed asking questions of their Android phones. It’s easy to shrug our collective shoulders as if these technologies have always been around, but we’re really on a remarkable trajectory of quickening innovation, and Google is at the forefront of much of this development.

“I’m thrilled to be teaming up with Google to work on some of the hardest problems in computer science so we can turn the next decade’s ‘unrealistic’ visions into reality.”

As if Google’s endeavors into futurism needed a jolt.

Google’s Eric Schmidt appears to be continuing his media tour in New York this week. Yesterday, we posted a video of Schmidt sitting down one-on-one with The Economist’s Daniel Franklin, but today several U.K. publications are reporting on comments made by the Google Chairman at another one of his media stops last night. According to reports from both Daily Mail and The Independent, Schmidt defended the company’s controversial tax avoidance schemes by stating he is “‘proudly capitalistic”:

‘We pay lots of taxes; we pay them in the legally prescribed ways… ‘I am very proud of the structure that we set up. We did it based on the incentives that the governments offered us to operate…. ‘It’s called capitalism….‘We are proudly capitalistic. I’m not confused about this.’

The U.K.’s chairman of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee Margaret Hodge said Schmidt and Google should be ashamed:

For Eric Schmidt to say that he is ‘proud’ of his company’s approach to paying tax is arrogant, out of touch and an insult to his customers here in the UK,” she said.

“Ordinary people who pay their taxes unquestioningly are sick and tired of seeing hugely profitable global companies like Google use every trick in the book to get out of contributing their fair share… Google should recognise its obligations to countries like the UK from which it derives such huge benefits, and pay proper corporation tax on the profits it makes from economic activity here. It should be ashamed, not proud, to do anything less. ”

Schmdit continued: Read more