Motorola Mobility, which was bought by Google for $12.5 billion in May, will cut 20 percent of its workforce and shut nearly a third of its offices worldwide, Google said on Monday.
“These changes are designed to return Motorola’s mobile devices unit to profitability, after it lost money in fourteen of the last sixteen quarters,” Google said in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
The cuts are the first step in Google’s plan to reinvent Motorola, reports the NY Times, which has fallen far behind its biggest competitors, Apple and Samsung, and shore up its Android mobile business.
Motorola Mobility, which has 94 offices throughout the world, will center research and development in Chicago, Sunnyvale, California and Beijing. One-third of the jobs lost will be in the United States, but the company has not specified where or what facilities would be affected.
Earlier the New York Times reported Google’s plan and said it was looking to shrink operations in Asia and India, by not just exiting unprofitable markets but also stopping making low-end devices and focusing on a few cellphones instead of dozens. Google has also downsized Motorola Mobility’s management, letting go 40 percent of its vice presidents, but has also hired new senior executives, the New York Times said.
Google took over Motorola Mobility following an increase in patent litigation with smartphone makers — the acquisition saw Google gain more than 17,000 technology patents.
