Motorola created some amazing devices in 2013 with Google’s backing, including the Moto X and Moto G. Of course, it also lost obscene amounts of money each and every quarter while doing it. Lenovo is preparing to finalizethe deal to buy Motorola from Google, and it’s planning to stop the losses in short order. However, Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside isn’t going to be there to see it — Woodside has left Motorola to take the chief operating officer job at Dropbox. Is this the beginning of a Motorola brain-drain?
Woodside isn’t exactly a household name, but he is credited with leading the charge at Motorola over the last two years which resulted in the company once again making phones that people actually want to use. Losing him to Dropbox is undoubtedly a blow to Motorola, but he’s probably about to cash in big time on the Dropbox IPO. In some ways, it’s a step up — Dropbox is valued at about $10 billion right now, but the Motorola Mobility sale only valued the phone maker at a little under $3 billion.
Google bought Motorola back in 2012 probably expecting the company to continue losing money — although, hemorrhaging a few billion might not have been in the plan. It’s fairly clear at this point Google was willing to take that risk to get Motorola’s juicy patent portfolio, almost all of which it is holding on to. Lenovo isn’t buying Motorola to lose money, though. Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing says Motorola can be made profitable in just a few quarters. Let’s not ignore that Woodside was CEO of Motorola for two years as it lost money— that’s a big deal for a CEO.
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