Motorola Rebounds, Posts Small Profit in Q2

Motorola rebounded from three straight quarters of losses and posted a small quarterly net profit on Thursday. The Schaumburg, Ill.-based company reported a net profit of $26 million in the second quarter of the year compared with a net profit of $4 million a year ago. Motorola posted a net loss of $231 million in the first quarter. Earnings per share of one cent in the second quarter were better than expected by analysts who had forecast a loss of four cents per share. Revenue during the quarter ended July 4 fell 32% to $5.49 billion. Motorola's mobile phone division cut its operating loss in half compared with the first quarter. It rang up a second-quarter operating loss of $253 million on revenue which fell 45% to $1.8 billion. "In Mobile Devices, we improved the operating loss, reflecting a lower cost structure, and substantially reduced cash consumption as compared to the first quarter," Motorola co-chief executive Sanjay Jha said in a statement. "We have agreements in place with carriers and remain on track to bring our new smartphone devices to market for the holiday selling season." Motorola said it shipped 14.8 million handsets in the quarter, a slight increase from 14.7 million the first quarter, giving it an estimated global handset market share of 5.5%. Motorola said it expects to again post earnings per share of one cent in the current quarter. Motorola has said it hopes to have devices based on Google's open-source Android operating systems in stores by the fourth quarter of the year. Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2009