Google Wants Control of Your House, Buying Nest Labs for $3.2B

Consumer Electronics

Published: January 13, 2014 4:39 pm

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is not afraid of spending big bucks for hot ideas. Many investors know that Google has been investing in energy efficiency and other automation trends, but now comes a very large pact here that ultimately wants control of your house. Google is paying a whopping $3.2 billion to acquire Nest Labs, and the deal is all in cash.

For those readers who do not know who or what nest is, the company has started selling small electronic and digital connected devices which allow for people to remotely monitor boring household things like thermostats and smoke alarms. The thermostats help users to save energy, while the use can also give monitoring access to controls such as smoke/CO alarms.

That is what Nest can do now, but imagine the things it could control in the future. If Nest applications are able to expand in the house, Google could be in control of your entire home. Monday’s press release shows that Nest will continue to operate under the leadership of Tony Fadell, and it will continue to operate with its own distinct brand identity.

The $3.2 billion sounds like a lot for a company that has only started to gather some foothold in outlets like Home Depot and elsewhere. Still, Google’s market cap is $375 billion and the company’s cash and liquidity was more than $55 billion as of the end of the third quarter of 2013.

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