“Motorola Inc., the No. 3 mobile phone maker, said on Friday it would roughly halve the size of its research labs to about 300 people as it plans to halt some projects and move at least 180 people to other units,” Sinead Carew reports for Reuters.
“The loss-making company, which is planning to spin off its cell phone business amid huge market share losses and sharp criticism of its phone designs, said 180 research labs workers would be moved to its three business units, effective July 1,” Carew reports.
“To reduce costs, another 150 Motorola research positions will be cut worldwide as Motorola stops some research projects, according to spokeswoman Maya Komadina, who did not disclose which projects would end or in which countries,” Carew reports.
“Motorola, which has been losing ground in the cell phone market after failing to come up with a strong successor to its once-lauded Razr phone, is expected to spin off its mobile devices business in 2009,” Carew reports.
More info in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dirty Pierre le Punk” for the heads up.]
May 10, 2007: Motorola’s then-Chairman 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
Is Motorola intentionally trying to shoot itself in the foot and ensure that they get minimal value from their shareholders for the spun-off cell phone division?
Nice to get a little justice once in awhile…
MW = true
Motorola’s first Razr phone worked just fine for me. I could download my “Contacts” from Address Book, and did have a hack to get iCal into the phone. Then the phone was stolen!
The new Razr that I bought to replace it was their top of the line. It won’t interface with my Mac at all!!
I would probably have bought one for my wife and held off on an iPhone till my Telus contract waned, but not now!!
Screw Motorola. They are dead to me!
Oh come on MDN; the iPhone isn’t the sole reason Motorola’s been having problems. The fact that they haven’t come up with a successor to the RAZR is the issue. Stop declaring war on every single phone company simply because they make a product in the same field as Apple. The vast majority of people cannot afford or will not spend $200 on an iPhone, and are perfectly fine with a phone that simply makes calls and is given to them for free.
@Sense
Ummmmm… Where does MDN say that the iPhone is the sole reason Motorola’s having problems?
It’s time for a fresh quote from Greg Brown.
If their next model is the TAZR, they might be able to grab the university campus police market.
Moto can’t compete with Apple’s deep pockets!
I happen to like my slim, reliable, “just makes phone calls”, Motorolla phone.
Heck it only cost me $30 and I only pay less than $20 a month in cell phone minutes. (it’s a T*****phone)
People are just tired of “toys” they can no longer afford.
Now Blackberry is strong because they are required for buisnesses, so it’s a write-off.
Of course if Apple invaded the business space with their computers they could weather harsh times when people only buy what they need to make MONEY, not “TOYS” like the iPhone is.
But Apple is just scared of the business space.
@Mad Mac Maniac
um… wtf???
fine, you like your motorolla phone, good for you, but don’t even try calling an iPhone a ‘toy’, with v2 it can be used to play games, but for businesses it will be a major tool for anyone on the go. The enterprise tools that Apple is adding on with v2 are in direct competition to Blackberry and even one-ups it nicely. Apple is not ‘scared’ of the business space, they tend to concentrate on their strength, consumers, it’s only recently that they’ve paid business users any real attention and are starting to build for them as well as for us.
Just a thought – It seems like they need to INCREASE R&D;jobs, not reduce them.
@ Mad Mac Maniac,
Who cares what Afib thinks? How about a show of hands. I thought so.
Go peddle your bullshit elsewhere or I will direct everyone to your website and have them hijack your threads.
“Monday, bloody Monday”
Music by: Apple
Perfomance by: iPhone
“Motorola halves R&D;labs”
I hope they at least put up tarps. Schaumburg can get extremely cold in the winter.
Cutting R&D;is the opposite of what Motorola should be doing. Hurts morale, kills new products, when that’s what they desperately need.
Bye bye, Moto!
Well, that’s what you get for hiring a former moronic drug czar to help manage your crumbling empire:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Tandy
@ Grigori
So that’s why the newest Motorola radios for public service agencies suck!
My 18 year old Moto radio beats the pants off the crap Moto sells today.
Zucker & Zander the boobsy twins.
Oh, yeah.
The best thing any struggling tech company can do is cut R & D!
That’s not a recipe for a turn around. It’s a recipe for “let’s see if I can keep this boat afloat until I retire. After that, screw ’em!”
Mr Mad Mac is right in many ways.
I too sort of like my simple phone, but I really long to be able to do some of the cool things only an iPhone does well.
Apple *is* scared of the business space, but it’s a healthy respect type of fear, not the scaredy cat fear. Get it wrong in enterprise and it can really bite you in the butt.
I take issue with the claim that the iPhone is a toy as much as I reject the notion that the Mac is a toy.
My iMac is my business. It does what I need it to do effortlessly, accounting, faxing, web design, Photoshop, in short everything that runs my business.
I’m planning on getting the iP3G – having had my son show me all he can do on his now 10 month old 4Gb model. It will be a boon, allowing me much greater freedom from the office than I had before.
Hardly a toy.
iP3G: The 1337 prosthetic leg.
Cutting off your R&D;arm is a REALLY bad sign.
Motorola had a research department after 2006?
Hmmm, it seems to me that all the other iPhone-wanna-be-competitors have been increasing their R&D;departments, focusing solely on copying the esthetics of Apple’s products.
But then again, how many employees could it take to purchase Apple’s latest products, photograph them, trace them, and make wax molds from them?
“Hyuck! Look ever’body! Here’s ar latest “i- ( insert Apple product name here ) Killer!
Send out the press releases!”
Spokeswoman Maya Komadina. I wonder if she is a funky Komadina (Funky Comadina by Tone Loke)
And yes I know it is Funky Cold Media by Tone Loc Just in case you were going to jump all over that one.