After buying out its mobile business, Google acquires parts of another HTC unit

Google bought most of HTC’s smartphone business back in 2017, laying the foundation for recent Google Pixel phones. Now, the search giant has acquired parts of another HTC division to bolster its Android XR efforts.

Google announced early today (January 23) that it signed a deal to acquire “some” of the HTC Vive engineering team. HTC reportedly confirmed in a press conference in Taiwan that the deal was worth $250 million. Google will also obtain a non-exclusive license to use HTC’s XR intellectual property.

“They are an incredibly strong technical team with a proven track record in the VR space, and we are looking forward to working with them to accelerate the development of the Android XR platform across the headsets and glasses ecosystem,” Google explained on its blog.

The acquisition comes as Google and its partners work on the recently announced Android XR platform for headsets and smart glasses. The new platform supports the Gemini assistant, loads of Google apps (including Maps, Chrome, and YouTube), and multiple virtual screens. Samsung’s Project Moohan headset will be the first product running Android XR, but there’s no word on a launch date yet.

Spending money on a big team won’t necessarily guarantee success for Android XR, though. For one, Google’s Stadia game streaming platform was eventually killed off despite the formation of a first-party studio to develop games. But this still seems like a sensible move if the company wants to develop products in-house and if it wants Android XR to avoid the same fate as hordes of other ill-fated Google offerings.