Google cutting 20% of jobs at Motorola Mobility

8/13/2012 7:34 AM EDT

Adding additional sensors with additional software features definitely will have a good effect and comfort for the users.

8/13/2012 10:07 AM EDT

Really bad news for Obama. Now, the unemployment will tick up as the Bureau of Labor will add that up as lost jobs. Can someone ask Google to hold on?

8/13/2012 12:27 PM EDT

"Adding additional sensors with additional software features" is what everybody else in the business is doing. Take your conclusions.

8/13/2012 12:37 PM EDT

"Really bad news for Obama. Now, the unemployment will tick up as the Bureau of Labor will add that up as lost jobs. Can someone ask Google to hold on?" Great, now we have supposedly well-educated professionals who espouse that private industry should intentionally mislead the electorate for one party's political gain...did you ever stop to think that if that very same party lived up to its promises that unemployment would be 6% or less by the end of his first term that such lies would be unnecessary?

8/13/2012 12:48 PM EDT

I think this was inevitable, albeit terribly sad for the people who are going to be laid off.

PS. I believe that concentrating on higher end models would give more confidence to other Android platform manufacturers. Google should not compete head-on with other Android platform manufacturers, otherwise Android will lose its appeal.

8/13/2012 10:17 PM EDT

I just hope Motorola doesn't lose all of it's personality as it becomes part of Google. It was a great company at one time.

8/13/2012 10:55 PM EDT

One third of job cut in US... pretty sad but that seems to be expected. How the American employees can add values to the company? It is ironic that many big and successful business sectors are US companies and they generate quite impressive revenue but those can't really be beneficial to general employees in US as the money basically is making out of the cheap workforce outside US!

8/14/2012 3:13 AM EDT

Well, ain't that ironic. Many of those people who generated the 17k patents and ip are getting served up pink slips. It would be nice if Apple and Google could figure out how to be profitable without plundering their communities.

8/14/2012 9:50 AM EDT

Did Google ONLY buy Motorola for its patents and other IP? Then Motorola would be better served to be spun out somehow into a separate company again (with access to all it's former IP).

If Google has no intention of letting Motorola truly compete with Samsung why keep it held hostage?

8/14/2012 10:59 AM EDT

Paul Galvin founded Motorola in the 1920s with a unique product a car radio immune from EM noise due to spark plugs - hence the name. Son Bob grew it to the third largest electronics conglometrate in the world ( 1991 ) and stock split thrice in 6 years. But then he handed over the reins to his son Chris who ruined it by letting the various division heads fight among one another and hinder transition to new technologies e,g. a RISC processor at the Semiconductor division or moving from Analog to Digital cell phones. Then there was the Iridium fiasco - a satellite phone for those who could n't afford it ! And the disastrous push to grow in China and letting them get away with robbing Moto blind ( base - stations as well as wafer fabs ) in the vain hope of getting a leading market share in China. At the end of it the main reason for Motorola's downfall was cronyism in corporate decision making - a bunch of under - qualified engineers who had worked their way up to the board room by toadying to the Galvin family and made awful decisions in a consumer electronics world they had helped create but could no longer keep up with in spite of the terrific R&D that Google has now captured.

Sic transit gloria.

8/14/2012 12:40 PM EDT

The ultimate measure is value added. What value Motorola Mobility (MM) is bring on the table? What are the value of the MM's staff bringing to Google? Acquiring the patents is apparently an appealing move. Is Google looking for more from MM given ODM/ OEM vendors are primarily resided in Asia?

I guess the incidence has long been expected. Whatever has happened happened. It is a matter of how MM staffs come together to bring some good stuffs to the community. I can't wait to see these group of folks come up something exciting - the next big thing. ;)

8/14/2012 6:59 PM EDT

Chipmonk, how can you blame Galvin. I'd say that George Fisher had much more to do with the demise that Chris Galvin, focussing only on short term profit and ignoring long term effects of decisions that were made. All the spintering of the company started when he was at the helm. IMHO, of course. From good ole WIkipedia "In 2008, several years after Galvin's departure, a study was completed by the Monitor-Global Business Network consulting company to identify and compare the best + $5B in revenue global high tech corporate turnarounds since 1990. In comparing six year periods including three years of turnaround actions and the corresponding companies’ resulting financial performance, the study placed Galvin’s turnaround of Motorola as one of the top five large high tech turnarounds. The companies compared were IBM, Apple, Xerox, HP and Motorola."

8/19/2012 9:08 AM EDT

Motorola always hires the best of talent. The staff would definitely be picked up by the best in the industry but the stigma people's heart gets no one can cure that. I guess the corporate world of telecom/software as fascinating it is the same time its dangerous. But not sure how engineers can make an alternate earning at the initial part of their career.May be real estate or agriculture..