ARRIS Motorola Deal Gets DoJ Scrutiny, And it is a Complete Waste of Time

ARRIS, which is buying the Motorola Home business from Google, says it has received a request for
additional information and documentary materials from the Department of Justice, regarding ARRIS' proposed acquisition of the Motorola Home business from Google.

DOJ is reviewing the transaction for antitrust reasons, but some of us might argue the DoJ in this case really seems to be showing it has nothing more important to do, and is wasting its time.

Only two companies ever have mattered in the U.S. cable business, where it comes to the decoders ("set top boxes"). Those companies were Scientific-Atlanta (assets now owned by Cisco) and General Instrument (Jerrold, originially), whose assets are owned by Motorola.

In 30 years, no supplier other than S-A or GI ever supplied a significant number of set-top boxes to the U.S. cable industry.

No matter which firm owns those assets, nobody else matters. The S-A and GI franchises roughly split the market, and have for decades. There is no danger that one or the other will suddenly swoop in and dominate the business because the buyers (cable operators) have deliberate policies to keep both firms in business, each as a check on the other. That hasn't changed for decades, either.

Nor does it matter, strategically. The importance of the decoder, in a market that is both highly competitive and shifting in the direction of IP network delivery, is declining. Sure, cable operators use them as a conditional access gateway. But there will be other simpler ways of providing such admission control in an IP environment.

Some antitrust reviews are just dumb.