Lenovo lays off more than half of its remaining Motorola workforce (UPDATE)
Lenovo is shedding most of its remaining Motorola workforce
Update: Lenovo has officially announced the lay-off in a strategic shift to keep Moto competitive. Motorola has also reached out to us with an official press statement, which refutes suggestions that remaining staff would be moved away from the Motorola HQ in Chicago. You may find it at the bottom of this article.
Apparently, Lenovo is ramping up its efforts to move operations over to its native China, which would naturally be a more cost-effective strategy. One particular employee reportedly mentioned on Facebook that after two decades of service to Motorola, this coming Friday will be his last. The source of Droid-Life's report also believes that employees managing to avoid the axe will be moved from Motorola's long-standing digs in Chicago over to Lenovo's United States HQ in North Carolina.
The original, pre-2011 Motorola is dead as we knew it. The company was spun off into two entities: Motorola Solutions and Motorola Mobility. The latter, which is focused around the consumer-side mobile products, was snapped up by Google in 2011 before being passed on to Lenovo in 2014.
Lenovo's acquisition of Motorola Mobility has spawned a number of products such as the recent Moto Z series, which continues to champion Motorola's logo and archetypal design language. With only around 500 staff reportedly left in the US, however, Motorola is far removed from its former glories, and the future paints a rather bleak picture.
Lenovo today announced a resource action impacting less than two percent of its approximately 55,000 employees globally. The majority of the positions being eliminated are part of the ongoing strategic integration between Lenovo and its Motorola smartphone business as the company further aligns its organization and streamlines its product portfolio to best compete in the global smartphone market.
Lenovo is also making adjustments in other areas of the business as part of a continued effort to manage costs, drive efficiency and support ongoing improvement in overall financial performance. While these actions are never easy, they are a necessary part of our continued efforts to ensure long-term, profitable growth across all of our businesses.
Lenovo is absolutely committed to Chicago and we plan to maintain our Motorola Mobility headquarters there. Chicago has a well-deserved reputation for technical excellence and as the hub of our global R&D for our smartphone business we expect to take advantage of local talent to continue developing Moto products there.
Lenovo is also making adjustments in other areas of the business as part of a continued effort to manage costs, drive efficiency and support ongoing improvement in overall financial performance. While these actions are never easy, they are a necessary part of our continued efforts to ensure long-term, profitable growth across all of our businesses.
Lenovo is absolutely committed to Chicago and we plan to maintain our Motorola Mobility headquarters there. Chicago has a well-deserved reputation for technical excellence and as the hub of our global R&D for our smartphone business we expect to take advantage of local talent to continue developing Moto products there.
source: Droid-Life, Verge
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