Google to sell Motorola smartphone business to Lenovo for $2.9 bn Wednesday Jan 29,2014

Google announced on Wednesday iJan 29,2014 that t was selling its Motorola Mobility smartphone unit to Lenovo for about $2.9bn

Lenovo will pay $660m in cash, $750m in Lenovo shares, plus a $1.5bn three-year promissory note.

In 2011 Google paid $12.5bn for the Moto X and Moto G smartphone manufacturer. The acquisition, Google’s largest by far, came after Larry Page, Google's co-founder, took back day-to-day running of the company.

The sale comes as Google has turned its energies towards hardware as well as software products. The company is working on Google Glass, its wearable computer, a smart watch and driverless cars as well as tablets and laptops.

This is the second sale Google has made of assets it acquired after buying Motorola Mobility. In 2012 Google sold Motorola Home, which made set-top boxes and cable modems, to Arris for $2.35bn.

Lenovo,the world's largest PC manufacturer has been expanding into other areas. This is Lenovo's second large buy of the month. Last week the Chinese company paid $2.3bn for IBM's server business. It bought IBM’s laptop business in 2005