Can Android Save Motorola?

Motorola is betting all on the Android platform, but will the Android phone or phones be able to save Motorola? Just try to answer these questions:

1. Do you think it will be as popular as iPhone? Yes? Are you out of your mind?

2. As popular as Razr, a model more than 4 years old, still No.2 seller? No way.

3. As popular as Blackberry curve? No way.

4. What about Palm Pre? Maybe, maybe not.

5. HTC G1? Maybe.

The sad fact is Motorola is no longer an iconic company in any sense, young buyers no longer remember it as the inventor of the mobile phone industry. Given the choice between a 100 dollars Motorola Android phone and a 200 iPhone, which one will you choose? Forget business users, no company in their right mind will ditch Blackberry for Motorola. So this leaves them vying for the crumbs with third tier companies. That maybe enough for an upstart like HTC without much baggages, however Motorola has first tier baggages. 

In the best scenario, Motorola maybe able to make a decent Android phone, so it can spin off the PCS for good or find a buyer. In any case, more probably they will unceremoniously leave the mobile phone industry, just as IBM leaving the PC industry.

Motorola Laying off 550 in Chicago Area

According to Chicago Tribune, Motorola was going to lay off 550 people locally. Although I have left Motorola long time ago, many of my friends are still working there, and several have been affected. In the past 2 years I have been watching Motorola with sadness and disgust, it is an exemplary case of how clueless boards and carpet bagging CEOs destroying great companies. While Chris Galvin was mediocre, at least he still cared about the company, so even after missing the boat of TDMA and CDMA phones, the disaster of Iridium, the collapse of the Pager group and the burst of Internet bubble, Motorola fared much better than companies with recruited CEOs like Lucent and Nortel. But when the board hired Ed Zander, things just went down the drain. He was simply clueless and he did not care, the only thing he cared about was his wallet. The same is Ron Garriques. Together they managed to destroy a legendary company in less then 3 years. Garriques bailed ship when he knew it was sinking, Zander landed with golden parachute. Now it is the hardworking people bearing the blunt of their mismanagement. 

It is a sad truth that today the capitalism of United States is no longer the capitalism of entrepreneurs, it is the capitalism of share holders who have no say and no clue. Thus there is no other thing standing between the way of the CEOs to rob the very companies they are mismanaging except the boards. But why should the board directors care? They got paid for just sitting there, and they did not lift a finger to build the companies they are supposed to oversee. These companies become nobody's property. The boards put huge chunks of money(it is not their own, right?) into the carpetbags so these guys can feast for the rest of their lives. That is why you see once great companies being mismanaged to oblivion while the CEOs are golfing and flying private jets.  And do not be surprised to see more following down the same path.