Motorola loses for third quarter in a row

NEWS Motorola surprised the markets yesterday by posting a profit for its mobile phone division. Despite the good news Motorola still made a loss of £105m for the third quarter ended 30 September. Although sales fell by 16 per cent as demand for handsets fell the mobile division made a profit of $19m. Motorola will shed 22 per cent of its staff this year to cut costs. Christoper Galvin, chief executive of Motorola, said the company had been predicting an upturn in the US economy before the events of September 11. He said in a statement: "Until the unexpected and horrific atrocities of 11 September, our predictive indicators seemed to indicate the world would most probably return to more positive economic growth in the first or second quarter of 2002. These events make near-term forecasting more challenging."