Motorola still in the red, no light at the end of the tunnel yet
by Chris Ziegler 
posted Jan 23rd 2008 at 2:59PM
Motorola's fourth quarter and 2007 earnings turned out to be pretty bleak indeed -- as expected, perhaps -- and according to the company, it expects a further slide through the first quarter in both sales and market share. The company pulled in about $9.65 billion through the final quarter of the year, which sounds like a nice number and all until you realize that it's an 18.2 percent decline from its sales in the fourth quarter of 2006. For the full year, the company garnered $36.6 billion, down 15 percent from 2006 on the whole. In terms of handsets, Moto pushed 40.9 million of them in the quarter -- with 53 percent sold in North America -- which it estimates is good enough for 12.4 percent market share worldwide. New CEO Greg Brown said that he believes the company is aligning its strategy the way it needs to be, but that its handset business is going to take even longer to recover than expected. How far down the charts do these guys stand to slide before they're back in the black?[Via mocoNews]
Filed under: Motorola
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Ben @ Jan 23rd 2008 3:38PM
That Frown is funny....But Moto is very sad...
chainstay @ Jan 23rd 2008 3:52PM
Motorola Mobile Devices is finished, done. Very sad, ruined by incompetent executives like Zander and Garriques, and stupid yes-man middle management. Icahn must be beside himself; circle-M circling the drain in a death spiral now, the end will come swiftly.
mobileserver @ Jan 23rd 2008 4:02PM
Moto lack vision.
It still lives in the past RAZR world and glory.
No touch screen and/or WM devices.
I just hope that the executives get out of their office more often to find out what customers want.
MIKE @ Jan 23rd 2008 4:14PM
What about the ROKR E6 and the Ming, they were both touch screen.... what about The Q its WM. I agree that Moto lacks vision but lets not go saying that they didn't make any touch screens or WM devices.
Dopes @ Jan 23rd 2008 4:40PM
TS is hardly the reason why moto is doing bad(just member that over 90% of smartphones dont have TS... nokia/symbian has 75% of smartphones and nokia havent had single TS phone since 2005 thougt some coming this year). Motos prob is those not famous razr copys and crappy os while totally missing smartphones to nokia and not being able to take profits from cheapo phones. Samsung and nokia taking cheap phones to their control nokia dominating that too and taking even more profit out of them than anybody. Moto is still hanging there with the middle segment and because of it's control in usa.
What they need is a new cheap razr type of hit for the developing counties or smartphones with proper os, features and screen for Europe and Asia.
Just wait for tomorrow when nokia releases it results it will have broken that 40% marketshare from q3 39%..... yes i'am a shareholder .
xB Owner @ Jan 23rd 2008 5:29PM
I think some of the earlier comments are correct. Moto had a hit with their Razr. At the time, no one else was doing thin. At least not well. Since then, they have essentially sat on their butts with mediocre attempts to recapture the lightning in a bottle that was the original Razr. Having a compact design isn't nearly enough to compete in today's cell phone market... at any level.
I think the key to today, and more importantly tomorrows mobile market is "convergence." Many manufacturer's have taken their shot at convergent devices, and most have failed. Some have had mild success, but in my opinion no one has truly succeeded yet. I know the Apple fan boys are probably writhing in their seats right now, but I think the device is still missing some basic functionality. (Where is my stereo bluetooth support?)
Consumers today want good call quality, up to date design (thin is definitely still good), and value for their money. The average consumer mobile device today should have 3G support, quality audio (sound and format support), a decent camera, removable memory, a "pocketable" design, and possibly email access. And do it all at a reasonable price. (Even if it means signing a contract with a carrier.)
The average consumer (not engadget junkie) has no need for WinMo or any other smart phone OS. They don't need to browse the web on a 2" screen. But they would like to be able to carry a single device to make calls on, take a decent picture with and listen to their favorite music on. Convergence.
Added features like WinMo, web browsers, office and other custom applications are great for smart phones, and a market Motorola definitely needs to address. But what they really need is that one phone that really captures the broadest of markets. Kind of like they did with the original Razr.
And as a frame of reference I currently use an old Razr on T-Mobile. That phone replaced a Moto A630 which replaced one of the original Nokia camera phones. I used to ride on the bleeding edge of consumer phones, but not any longer. Especially not with Motorola. Not after my experience with the last two Motos.
I'll be looking at Samsung and LG when it comes to my next mobile device.
PH0ENIX @ Jan 28th 2008 4:14AM
"Moto pushed 40.9 million of them in the quarter -- with 53 percent sold in North America"
It's interesting that the US is Motorola's biggest handset market, yet all their cool new phones (such as the models reported on this fine site) are available to Asian markets first before making their way to the states, if at all. I'm not sure why this is, perhaps because Moto wants to field test their products in smaller markets before delivering them to American consumers, but I'm not sure that is a strategy that is necessary (look at Apple).