Comment by chubot

Uh weird that I got downvotes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_(operating_system)#His...

Android Inc. was founded in Palo Alto, California, in October 2003 by Andy Rubin and Chris White

Google acquired the company in July of [2005] for at least $50 million

It was ad-supported of course, but it's definitely not similar to IBM acquisitions