Google swinging axe, cutting its Motorola workforce by 10 percent
Google swinging axe, cutting its Motorola workforce by 10 percent

                      
                      
          The Associate Press is carrying the news, obtained via the Wall Street Journal, that Google is laying off 1,200 more Motorola folks. This amounts to about 10 percent of Google's still-somewhat-freshly acquired Motorola Mobility operating unit.
The last time we really touched base on Google and Motorola was back in October, when we noted that Motorola contributed significantly to Google's Q3 2012 earnings slide. Google had previously cut about 4,000 jobs on acquisition last August, and the latest round of cuts seems to reinforce Google's intent when acquiring Motorola in the first place: it's not the people or the products, it's the patents.
Once a dominant and innovative player in the cellular phone market, Motorola's Mobility division had almost a virtual license to print money with handsets like the iconic StarTAC and striking RAZR. Motorola Mobility's long rise to prominence brought with it an accretion of valuable patents (about 17,000 of them, in fact). Even as Motorola struggled to adapt and put out products in a smartphone-centric world, that patent portfolio made it attractive enough to motivate Google's purchase of the failing business unit.
Google's interest in Motorola Mobility's actual manufacturing and design capabilities has never been great, and continues to be tepid. Investors seem to approve of the layoffs, though, as Google's stock is up almost $4 in pre-market trading as the news of the cuts begins to filter out.
Along with this round of layoffs, Google is expected to further pare down its Motorola division by selling off its set-top business, which employs an additional 7,000 people.


          
                      
                  