“Motorola Inc. announced plans to separate its struggling handset business from other operations Wednesday, forming two separate publicly traded companies after months of agitation from frustrated investors,” The Associated Press reports.
“The suburban Chicago-based cell phone maker has been under pressure from billionaire investor Carl Icahn for changes meant revitalize its cell-phone business. The cell phone unit has seen its sales and stock price plummet with the company unable to produce second act to the once-popular Razr phone,” AP reports.
“Motorola said the handset business will operate separately from another company that will encompass its home and networks business, which sells TV set-top boxes and modems, and its enterprise mobility solutions, which sells computing and communications equipment to businesses,” AP reports.
Full article here.
Motorola’s press release is here.
May 10, 2007: Motorola Chairman (until May) and then-CEO Ed Zander said his company was ready for competition from Apple’s iPhone, due out the following month. “How do you deal with that?” Zander was asked at the Software 2007 conference Wednesday in Santa Clara, Calif. Zander quickly retorted, “How do they deal with us?” – IDG News Service
Bloodbath.
Motorola proves what the pundits always say about Apple is wrong. They say Apple is all about pretty hardware and marketing.
Well the Razr was pretty and well marketed and now they can’t give them away.
Why? the user experience was shit.
Apple is all about the user experience. Pretty and marketing gets the hardware into the users hands. The user experience keeps it there.
A good lesson from which to learn.
Had the ball with the PowerPC chip and had a golden opportunity with the Razr, but could expand on neither. Should’ve been courting Apple instead of ignoring them.
These guys were doomed without iPhone – don’t think for a second Apple has anything to do with their ongoing demise. It’s all about software, which anyone who has had a Motorola knows they cannot code at all. The guys who prosper are the platform companies like iPhone, RIM, and even WinMo, Symbian (although it pains me to say that).
MDN, Thanks for those great “comment” reminders. It really puts the “egg on the face” just where it belongs.
OVER priced CEOs that spend their time dreaming and ranting and raving get what they deserve.
JMHO.
en
Calif. Zander quickly retorted, “How do they deal with us?”
You are too far in the rear-view-mirror for Apple to bother with.
@Blue Dream
Don’t forget about the 6502, 6800, 68000, 68002, etc. While MS’s chip maker (Intel) was advertising like crazy, Motorola was nowhere to be seen. They have no one to blame but themselves.
Carl Icahn is such an icon. Or, is that iCon???
Looks to me when another company starts to rag on Apple with their products, its a sign that they are in deep doo doo.
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Motorola, despite having had what I consider the best microcontroller chips on the market, squandered whatever advantage they had by their stupid marketing and policies. Like, would you believe, in order to get design info for a chip, you had to suffer through their legal department’s NDA just to get the info you need to design with their chips. The process was anything but streamlined. If it were me running the company I’d try and get all the data sheets in the company posted on every refrigerator in the country. I’ll leave it at that and not get into the ass-backwards convoluted development software they produced (and still do under the Metrowerks name now, al la CodeWarrior).
What are they left with now, making walkie-talkies?
I think Motorola should go back to their origin and make car radio again. They were the best.
Motorola could go back to making TVs in wooden cabinets.
Smart move though, spin out the cell phone business, put some lipstick on that pig, and sell it to the Chinese.
Didn’t they do this already?
Because MOT was told by Jobs that they could no longer sell CloneMacs for less money than Apple had to — while getting a $250 license for $100, and still publicly bitching that that was too much — MOT decided it would be a great idea to switch out all the Macs in the typing pool — 25,000 — to Win95 machines. Hmmm.
Ever see a MOT commercial? Any ‘MOT inside’ stickers?
Good partner, indeed.
GFR.
and the bottom drops out…..
I had a Razr for a year or so… At the time, I’ve got to say it was a breakthrough as far as thinness and overall looks. But now that I think about it, it was such a frustrating piece of shit to use.
I think back at what I went through to do even the simplest of tasks, and I am amazed.