October 2019 in Tech: A Flavor of the Month

The biggest stories in consumer technology, e-sports, retail, entertainment, and digital marketing.

Google buys Fitbit for $2.1 billion

+ What’s the deal?

Google LLC has acquired Fitbit for $7.35 per share in cash. They were trading for comfortably less than $3 in August.

Fitbit will join Google, which is a significant detail to this deal. One might have expected them to sit alongside Google in the Alphabet group.

The deal is expected to close in 2020.

CNBC covered the story on TV with this mind-bending, blood-curdling pun:

+ What has Google said?

“We’re looking forward to working with the incredible talent at Fitbit, and bringing together the best hardware, software and AI, to build wearables to help even more people around the world.”

Cool.

For its part, Fitbit says your health data will not be used by Google to target ads.

Dunno about you, but I’m feeling reassured.

+ Why has Google made this acquisition?