Motorola's desire to realign its company structure by selling off its cable and wireless networking business is once again taking yet another turn.
As reported in the Wall Street Journal, sources close to the matter say that the company will sell off its wireless networking business and then separately spin off the cable Set Top Box (STB) business with its wireless handset business into a publicly-traded company. Although there were rumors that Arris, Huawei and a group of private equity firms made initial moves on the STB unit, Motorola decided to put the sale of that business on hold because it was not satisfied with the offers it received.
If this proposed sale does go through, Motorola would be reduced to a company with only about $7 billion focused on selling public radio equipment and bar-code scanners.
While Motorola has not publicly laid out its restructuring plans, a statement made by Motorola co-Chief Executive Officer Greg Brown on a Jan. 29 conference call was quite revealing. "We are moving full steam ahead on separation," adding that it is "continually working on the appropriate structures for separation." Not surprisingly, when a call participant asked for more information, a company spokesperson would say nothing more than just referring back to the comments.
For more:
- Wall Street Journal has this article
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