UNhappy MOTO

Normally I would not blog about my company or a previous employer. My feeling is, that just like talking about old girlfriends, the mud sticks and you don't look good no matter what.

However, this story about Motorola is one that I feel I can though as an ex-employee who left the company for the primary reason that I knew this would happen to Moto.

What a sad state of affairs Motorola finds itself in. I have to say they have no-one to blame but themselves and of course the corporate American team who didn't get the obvious fact - RAZR was getting old fast.

In fact, its even worse that they are not even going to try and fight back, just spin the division off into the deadpool. That is the only place the handset division has to go. Perhaps if they stopped funding "corporate heads" and actually concentrated on the business of selling phones they might have a chance, but this isn't going to happen.

Motorola reminds me of the Titanic and the corporate team are too busy re-arranging the deck chairs to launch the lifeboats and save the division.

I can remember the quote from my old boss Simon Thompson who said, "RAZR is old, done, and we need consumers to love Motorola the brand, not RAZR the phone." While he had the marketing knowledge, no one in Shamburg wanted to stick their head out of the sand and admit that he was right.

Hense he left the company. And now so will any remaining employees with any shred of talent or corporate dignity. Sad but true the talent has left the building along with market share and our old friend share price.

So can Motorola be saved, would I go back? The answer is no to both. The company is to US focused and it has lost the people that could make it work. Competition is to strong now for them to make a comeback. My play - Shut Moto's handset division down? Probably the only thing you can do. There is no savior that I can see.

What apple and Nokia do so well is not only the design, but the software - And this is where Motorola really struggles. It has never invested in this area and if it did, it might have had a chance.

Again, too late now. RIP.

Quote from Endgadet:
Rumor no longer, Motorola is taking a hard look at its Mobile Devices unit and might very well give those slackers the ol' Freescale treatment and spin off the division as a separate company. This sort of love 'em and leave 'em tactic is oddly a bit of a habit with Motorola when times are bad, and times certainly have been better -- Motorola's phone unit lost $388 million this quarter, compared to $341 million in earnings a year ago. Motorola may sell the unit or spin it into its own company, which would leave Motorola with precious few intersections with the RAZR-saturated consumer, and as more of a government and enterprise business. Says Greg Brown, current president and CEO: "We are exploring ways in which our Mobile Devices Business can accelerate its recovery and retain and attract talent while enabling our shareholders to realize the value of this great franchise." It's a pretty odd statement for any company to make, and considerations may be further along than they sound, but either way we'll be keeping an eye out for any developments.