Motorola to Split Company in Two By Teresa von Fuchs WirelessWeek - March 26, 2008 Motorola announced plans to split the company into two publicly traded entities. The handset division will be spun off into its own company and the other company will include broadband and mobility solutions. Motorola said it expects the separation to take place sometime in 2009. The separation will take the form of a tax-free distribution to shareholders, meaning shareholders will own shares in both companies. The news sent Motorola shares up 6.4% in pre-market trading. “Our decision to separate our mobile devices and broadband and mobility solutions businesses follows a review process undertaken by our management team and board of directors, together with independent advisers,” said Greg Brown, Motorola's president and CEO, in a statement. “Creating two industry-leading companies will provide improved flexibility, more tailored capital structures and increased management focus – as well as more targeted investment opportunities for our shareholders.” Brown also said that Motorola is searching for a new chief executive for the mobile devices business: “We believe strongly in our brand, our people and our intellectual property, and expect that the Mobile Devices business will be well-positioned to regain market leadership as a focused, independent company.” Source:
To what e-mail address can I send my résumé ? :browani: ...at least they didn't sell out to some Korean or Chinese company. I think the US gov't put a hand in there to prevent that, since Moto makes alot of military equipment. Splitting the company in two seems like a decent alternative. They keep the brand, there's no outside influence, and if the hanset division tanks, they can just kill it and keep the networks division.
The timing is interesting. Motorola started the cell revolution something like 25 years ago with the first portable analog phone. Now Motorola has basically died a month after analog did.
I just hope their Mobile Handset division doesn't end up like the old cast-off AT&T Wireless, where it flounders on its own and ends up getting swallowed by someone else (or possibly the sibling it originally split off from).
True. But at least they aren't going for that right off the bat. They are giving them a chance to make a go of it first... but if that fails, then yea, this would make it easier for a foreign company to buy them, since the handset division would have no relation (I think) to Moto's military equipment manufacturing department (or their networks either for that matter). It's a sad day for Moto, but these days the handset biz is different than 10 or 20 years ago. Then stuff was built to last. Now it's almost disposable stuff, since people get a new one every 2 years on average anyway, since technology changes so fast. And throw in cheap Asian manufacturers with tons of flashy phones, and it makes for a really cutthroat biz to be in.
How ironic... If Motorola does leave the handset business I will miss them, most of my phones are Motorolas. Moto does need to really go strong in the PPC market if they intend to survive (and keep my business). PPC's are becoming more & more popular, and the Q just isn't cutting it. -Jay
Where is the SCPL? Where is the MOTOFONE for the US? These things were promised months ago and now nothing... just because they're shaking up (and now splitting off) the handset business is no reason to stop production on new models. Motorola hasn't done anything lately. They need to keep interest... or perhaps they're rebranding. Regardless, I'm totally scrwed if they change everything. I'd have to learn a new GUI.
It happened to Lucent. How about a nice Indian Jaguar or Land Rover? Big companies do that sort of thing.
Looks back on collapsing mobile phones division of Siemens, one of the great communications provider and solutions, could Motorola succeeded. Off course they must prepared all well. , and be bigger like Sony-Ericsson does.
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (SymbianOS/9.1; U; en-us) AppleWebKit/413 (KHTML, like Gecko) Safari/413 es70) If the spin-off of Motorola's mobile phone division is anything like their semiconductor divisions (On Semiconductor & Freescale Semiconductor), there probably won't be that many changes other than a possible name change.
well you know that if they are two publicly traded companies this could be a chance for growth......you wont have to worry about one set of products to pull down the other......so even if the cellular business starts dying the mobile broadband and others/miscellaneous will do fine.....
That is if the "new" Motorola companies get their act together and produce new and quality devices. Squeezing the life out of the RAZR line put them in this mess in the first place. This should be Motorola's new logo: :deadhorse
Could be the beginning of the end. Remember when AT&T did the same thing. They broke of the Broadband, Wireless and The phone division and one by one gobbled up. Broadband went to Comcast, Wireless to Cingular and MA BELL to SBC.
Motorola is a huge force in electronics, but their handset business is just about their only consumer product that caries the Motorola brand. Motorola makes POS equipment for the retail and service industry under the name Symbol (I absolutely love their bar code readers) They also make network equipment for cellular networks, and they make equipment for 2 way radio communication which is used extensively by fire, rescue, and law enforcement. WIth the amount of money available due to increases in homeland security spending, their mobile 2 way radio business is doing very well. Splitting the company will allow them to let the handset division be leaner & meaner, and hopefully get more innovative products to market faster. If it doesn't survive it will prevent the handset business from bringing down the rest of the company. -Jay
Agreed. Motorola also makes pagers, our company uses them exclusively, infact I am wearing one on my belt right now. OT, I was a bench tech for Motorola, servicing law enforcement's 2 way radios when I was going to school.
I forgot about pagers. Its been so long since I've even seen anyone with a pager. They also make cordless phones & answering machines, but I don't think that is a major part of their business. I do have a Motorola cordless phone at my office. That thing has taken ungodly amounts of abuse over the years, and it keeps on going. We have dropped it countless times on the hard linoleum & concrete floors and have yet to break it. I think its downfall is going to be the battery. It doesn't hold a charge as long as it used to, and its not worth spending $10 for a battery for a cordless phone that only cost $20 5 years ago. -Jay
I think it's an interesting move, and I'd be curious to see what happens in the long run. I see it definitely impacting customer service for the better
They also make Cable TV recievers and Modems, they have their fingers in to many pots IMO. They make good, but over priced 2 Way radios when compared to the competition. Symbol is nice but the WM always locks up on mine and constantley warm booting is old.
The Moto SurfBoard cable modem is all I've ever used with several different cable companies over the years.
they're very reliable....also the Motorola cable boxes are all i see around here in Reading and we have Comcast, Service Electric, and some other company.....they all use Moto
if i am not mistaken Motorola exited the pager business several years ago. some one else is making them and could be selling them under the Motorola name.
Not only that...you'd have to learn a new user name for the forums here!! It just wouldn't be right anymore to keep MOTO in hooligan. Back to Rancid.
LOL, The change would turn you Rancid... LOL... Anyway. If Motorola changes their GUI my family is screwed. I've been buying mom Motorola phones, because the GUI is the same on all of them, that way she doesn't have to learn how to use a new phone. At least I have pleanty of Motorola phones, and if her phone died I could give her another that worked the same. -Jay
