Google acquires 217 patents from IBM

In the last week of 2011, Google bought  217 patents from IBM in a deal that was officially recorded at the patent office on December 30, 2011.

The patent transaction was discovered by a reader via the United States Patent Trade Office (USPTO), who wishes to remain anonymous.  It was for 188 granted patents and 29 printed patent pendings, across quite a large range of technological areas being covered by what's been bought.  Things like network performance, email administration and instant messaging client functionality are all in place; but there also seems to be a significant lean towards covering phone and mobile technologies.