A report from Panda Daily on Tuesday said Google has bought parts of the games controller firm, Green Throttle Games.
The deal includes two of the three co-founders of the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company--Matt Crowley, who use to work for Nokia and Palm, and Karl Townsend, the lead engineer on the first and second generation Palm Pilot handheld computers, according to The Guardian.
Google stated that founder Charles Huang, the developer of Guitar Hero, would keep the rights to the business, but did not say how much the deal was worth, Daily Mail reported. The deal strengthens rumors started last July about Google making its own console and working on a set-top box.
Green Throttle's service takes the form of an app, which can be added to phones, tablets and other devices and can be used to link with smart TVs. Players use an Atlas control pad, which bears a resemblance to the Xbox controller, and a maximum of four pads can be connected through Bluetooth. The controller parts and app were included in Game Throttle's deal with Google, according to Daily Mail.
Google tried to enter the set-top box market in October 2010 with the realization of Google TV, which ended up not succeeding as planned with Logitech, the creator of an early set-up box. In fact, it lost millions of dollars, The Guardian reported. However, Google released Chromecast, a plug-in attachment for TV sets that could play content on the web, last year. Sundar Pichai, Google's head of ChromeOS and Android, said last week that millions were sold in the US and that Chromecast will soon be released in other countries.
Founded in 2012, Game Throttle made the new deal four months after the company stopped releasing the Arena app, Daily Mail reported.
The reports of Google working on a set-top box came out at the same time that Amazon was reported to be working on a similar device, with recent rumors stating Amazon's device could be released by the end of the month Daily Mail reported. With Green Throttle's Bluetooth technology, Google has the opportunity to build a combination of a set-top box and controller to compete with other consoles.
