Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) has been in deep trouble for a while now. For some untold reason, the company placed almost all its growth bets on its wireless division but has not produced a hit handset in years. Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) and Samsung Electronics have been producing and selling all kinds of cutting-edge wireless handsets to carriers all over the world. What has Motorola been up to?

It's still producing handsets, but so many of the designs and marketing strategies have been commodities lately. Meanwhile, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) has taken the mobile crown with the iPhone, and even Palm Inc. (NASDAQ: PALM) has risen from the dead with the new Palm Pre. Motorola was in such bad shape financially that it even suspended the spinoff of its mobile unit last year.

Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) will report its third quarter earnings tomorrow morning, and we'll see what kind of results CEO Greg Brown has been able to muster. The wireless giant, which is about to split itself up soon, now may find its wireless division spinoff not quite the saving grace it was six months ago.

Indeed, Motorola has followed up a dismal 2007 with a subpar 2008 as well. The company still can't get itself out of the hole its distinctive RAZR phone left when it debuted in 2004. Since then, the company has not followed up with any blockbuster consumer products and has let global wireless handset vendors like South Korean giants LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics to literally eat its sales and profit lunch.

As such, expectations tomorrow morning are for Motorola to earn just a penny per share at revenue of $7.83 billion. Even this would be quite a drop from the year-ago period of $0.06 per share on revenue of $8.81 billion. Handset shipments for the quarter are expected to come in under 30 million units compared to the year-ago figure of over 37 million units. Motorola, for now, does not have the product portfolio or design moxie to outgun its rivals, and global market leader Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK) continues to steadily up its market share as well. Every handset vendor is nipping at Motorola's heels, and unless the company ramps up -- well, everything -- 2009 will be another year to forget.

Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) seems to be in the midst of a crisis, even as it prepares to split itself into two companies to give shareholders more visibility into just how bad one part of its business can be while the other piece can be, well, not so bad. Of course, I'm talking about the wireless giant's cellphone division, which is still in the top three worldwide in terms of sales. It's sinking faster than a rock, though. How did this come to pass?

After reading a missive by a former Motorola employee, Numair Faraz, who worked closely with the late Geoffrey Frost -- Motorola's former Chief Marketing Officer and father of the RAZR handset -- one has to wonder about a few things. For example, just what kind of incompetence has brewed in the corner office for the last three years? From reading Faraz's words, both former CEO Ed Zander is pitched as a complete idiot and slave driver who literally worked Frost to death and current CEO Greg Brown is pitched as a technological moron who can't even use email (his secretary prints off messages to read to him later). Are these truths? They sure could be.

Zander, who was highly regarded when he came back in 2004 to take over for CEO (and grandson of company founder) Chris Galvin, seemed to have everything going for him. Looking back, nothing ever went right for Zander. The RAZR that gave Motorola its two-year recognition was in the works before he arrived. What did Zander -- a former president of Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA) -- do during his tenure with Motorola?

Swipe big chunks of compensation while churning out middling performance, according to many on Wall Street and Faraz as well. Maybe Galvin was not such a bad CEO after all, right? When Faraz said in 2003 that "Motorola's biggest problem is that Samsung kicks ass," he wasn't kidding -- and that's precisely what happened. Seems to be another example of very sub-par performance being rewarded with a golden parachute, while shareholders get shafted once again. Motorola stood at under $10 a share early today.

Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT), the company that defined two-way radio communications decades ago and helped invent the cellular telephone business in the 1980s, may be looking to shed itself of its handset division. After one of the best wireless handset success stories ever with the 50 million-strong RAZR, the company has been mired in sagging sales, market share losses and monetary losses all at the same time. Even the company's former CEO didn't escape, as Ed Zander left his CEO spot less than a month ago under severe fire from the investment community.

Motorola's shares have plunged based on its horrible financial results, today standing at just over $11.30 per share, giving the company a market cap of just over $25 billion. The company's current malaise is largely due to the complete ineptness of its handset division, which for some reason fell off the wagon completely after the RAZR became the wireless handset darling of this decade. Motorola has seen suggestions of a breakup to unlock shareholder value, something longtime investor activist Carl Icahn has advocated.

Will Motorola dump its handset division and concentrate on becoming an enterprise equipment company instead of a consumer one? Analyst Richard Windsor speculated this week that the world's second-largest handset maker may indeed sell its wireless handset division. If a sale is made, the buyer will have a plethora of problems to fix; problems that, for some reason, are being evaded at Motorola's largest competitors in the space. Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK),for example, seems to be doing quite well.

Is Motorola, Inc. (NYSE:MOT) really spinning out of control? According to this Forbes article, the picture is incredibly bleak for Motorola right now.The "Motorola RAZR" fever that swept the wireless industry over a few years ago has worn off completely, and Motorola has fallen way behind rivals in getting new and exciting products to market. Samsung and Nokia Corp. (NYSE:NOK) are introducing new and fresh products every other day it seems -- but where is Motorola?

It's losing profit by leaps and bounds as it aggressively discounts older but still nice-selling handset inventory. Instead of competing with newer and rapid-fire models that are coming out of competitor Samsung these days, Motorola is bringing tired, old designs to market with more colors -- not exactly innovative. Sure, the Motorola RAZR brought the company back to the limelight in 2004 and 2005 -- but its handset product division is now old and boring according to industry experts. Is Ed Zander to blame?

He took the helm at Motorola just as the Motorola RAZR was being finalized in development -- so he had nothing to do with that success (although he took credit). The Street has been asking Zander "what have you done for me lately," and so far, he has no response. The once-hailed leader of Motorola during the last few years is seeing issues all over the place as competitors step up to quash it at every turn. Losing design and marketing wunderkind Ron Garriques to Dell last week will only amplify Motorola's misfortunes. 2007 will be the "put up or shut up" year for Zander -- will he survive?

Although Motorola (NYSE: MOT) sold more RAZR wireless handsets in its latest quarter than ever before, the company will be shedding about 3,500 jobs according to CEO Ed Zander. This comes as Motorola's profits sank over 40% in its latest quarter even as the wireless giant shipped more phones than ever.

Say it with me -- keep costs under control. Zander's past experience as an operational guru should bode well for MOT investors, as the guy apparently knows how to control costs and keep expenses down as most levels. But Motorola's mixed bag of results for its latest quarter smells of the earlier tenure of Chris Galvin more than operational expert Ed Zander.

The cuts will come from middle management as well (get rid of all that red tape!) and will comprise about 5% of Motorola's overall global employee base. The cost savings are estimated at $400 million annually as wireless handset profit growth is expected to soften significantly this year, even as volume ramps up a bit.

Motorola, Inc. (NYSE:MOT) has made what I consider to be an incredible comeback in the last few years, mostly riding on the heels of the great success of the Motorola RAZR, which is just about to turn a few years old -- and it's still on the market after that long. What Motorola has done is attributable to this single model, which has sold over 50 million units since its introduction in the fall of 2004. The question of the hour is this -- can Motorola parlay that success into all its "copycat" models? From the Motorola Q to the new KRZR to the SLVR handset, this "slim" fashion has caught Motorola and indeed the entire wireless industry by surprise -- and now everyone is making "slim" wireless handsets.

Motorola has managed to pole-vault itself ahead of global handset leader Nokia in the U.S., with a staggering 40% plus market-share (which varies every quarter). Nokia Corp. (NYSE:NOK) was slow to respond to the "slim" phone craze that Motorola had started and is -- once again -- playing catch-up in that field; Nokia's overall global sales have slipped a little where Motorola's and Samsung's have increased. Even the venerable Sony Ericsson has made a huge comeback in handset sales using the "Walkman" and "Cybershot" brands from co-owner Sony Corp.'s (NYSE:SNE).

But, a one-hit-wonder does not make a company. Motorola isn't all that, but extending its success past the RAZR into a consistent presence that takes market-share away from leader Nokia is probably a main goal of the slim-phone giant at this time. How well it can execute this strategy as well as other pieces of its non-handset business like WiMAX infrastructure and related hardware could bode well for this telecommunications giant. In last quarter financials, Motorola profit slumped 45% from a year ago (due to a one-time gain last year), while revenue upped itself 17%. Does your portfolio include MOT shares?

Motorola seems to be getting all the media attention these days when it comes to the wireless handset biz. The manufacturer's RAZR handset is still going strong almost two years after its introduction to the marketplace. This is an unheard-of feat in the ages of shortening attention spans of wireless customers and accompanying product cycles that make sure wireless consumers get their fixes on the latest and slickest handsets they can.

Although the RAZR is now looking aged in many respects, Motorola has taken the "thin phone" concept to a huge array of models in an attempt to capitalize as much as possible on the fascination of thinness consumers now have after falling head over heels in love with the RAZR. Combine thin with easy-to-recognize names like RAZR, KRZR, PEBL and SLVR and Motorola seems to have an "Apple-esque" control on the consumer unlike many of its competitors. Nokia is even attempting to catch up in many respects, although it still owns the number-one spot for global wireless handset shipments.

Sony Ericsson, born out of a joint venture between Sweden's LM Ericsson and Japan's Sony, was unleashed upon the world in 2002 with the intention of creating a brand that was stronger than either company could establish individually. Years later, Sony Ericsson's use of the "Walkman" and "Cybershot" brands on its handsets have made the joint venture hugely profitable as well as producing phones specifically for mid-tier and high-end markets, leaving the entry-level handset business to Nokia and Motorola -- and Samsung.

The result? Although Motorola has overtaken Nokia as the largest wireless handset manufacturer in the U.S., Sony Ericsson was the fastest-growing wireless handset manufacturer in the latest quarter, even outpacing Motorola and market leader Nokia. Who knows if this will last, and if it is signaling a possible stagnation with Motorola's branding efforts (using names, not model numbers) along with RAZR craziness starting to wear off -- after only two years.

Motorola has had a recent resurgence of sorts, with the success of the Motorola RAZR having set the global wireless technology company ablaze here in the U.S. In fact, the thin RAZR phone has turned into Motorola's best-selling handset ever, with more than 50 million units ring-toning in cafes and sidewalks worldwide in under two years. The RAZR celebrates is second birthday this fall.

What has Nokia -- the global leader in wireless handset sales -- been doing during all this time? Well, it still is the world leader in handset sales, but it has been overtaken in the U.S. by Motorola, in an odd reversal of fortune. China is now the world's largest wireless market -- by far -- and brands like Samsung and Nokia have done well there, as well as brands like LG and Sony Ericsson.

Although the Motorola RAZR and SLVR thin phones have propelled Motorola back into prominence as a handset maker to be dealt with, Motorola is also taking the thin wireless handset concept into emerging markets, with a "Motofone" thin, no-frills handset with few design features that add cost but a huge draw factor in its thin design.

Consumers have taken to thin phone designs in droves, and Motorola believes it can transition that customer desire even into growing markets that don't need expensive handset designs and features, but do relish the though of slim phones.

Is Motorola on fire? You could say that -- the most popular wireless handset in history, the RAZR, is still going strong after almost two years in the marketplace, which is an unheard-of length of time for almost any consumer electronics gadget. Even Apple updates its venerable iPod more frequently.

With over 50 million RAZRs sold to date, and with the successor products well on their way to market -- along with existing products modeled after the "slim phone" concept the RAZR made popular, Motorola seems to be on top of the world. Its shares have not moved much in the last year, which is odd, as Motorola continues to chase marketshare away from larger competitor Nokia and has a product portfolio that seems irresistible to many consumers worldwide.

As such, Motorola cracked the top-10 in terms of Chinese manufacturers in the latest figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics in China. Think of all the electronic devices made in China these days, by the thousands of companies that operate there. Being ranked #6 out of the top 500 is no small feat. But, what does this mean? It means that Motorola, its biggest volume business being in cellphones, is making a heckuva lot of units in China these days -- and customers are buying them in droves. Will the story continue? Catch the replay sometime in 2007 to find out.

What kind of cellphone do you use? If you're in the majority, it's a Motorola handset. Motorola now has -- by far -- the largest share of the handset market in the U.S. and appears to be making a global run at Nokia to try and regain the top global spot for the first time in a decade. The jury is still out on whether Motorola can do this, but if the ultra-popular RAZR phenomenon continues -- and it does almost two years after release -- then Motorola will continue to make headway. It's rare that a single product carries a company like this, but just like Apple's iPod, Motorola's RAZR re-defined the category.

But it does not stop there. According to Forrester Research, Motorola is one of the top trusted brands in the wireless market, which includes hardware manufacturers and wireless carriers alike, from Motorola and Samsung to Sprint Nextel and Cingular Wireless. Samsung and Sprint Nextel rank among the least-trusted brands in the U.S., while Motorola and Verizon Wireless coming in at most-trusted levels, with Cingular Wireless and T-Mobile also pulling the same score. Just slightly off was Sprint Nextel, but that slightness was enough for a "least trusted" rating.

How about wireless handset manufacturers? In what I consider more perception than actual reality, handset makers Palm scored 4.3 and a B+ overall, while Motorola -- maker of the RAZR and other popular offshoot handsets, scored 4.2, for an overall grade of B. LG Electronics and Samsung fared the worst, both scoring 4.0, for overall grades of C- and D-, respectively. The "aura" around the Treo line of smartphones and the RAZR line of phones is probably due to the enormous loyalty customers have to both brands when such a subjective topic of "trust" comes along.

Samsung and LG and other makers have wireless handsets that topple the Motorola RAZR and other phones in terms of features and ease-of-use, but the sheer popularity and loyalty Motorola users have cannot be underestimated. If you create the market -- like the RAZR did for slim phones and the Treo did for on-the-go productivity -- then customers will always have "trust". MOT shares seem happy these days as a result.

Brian White has worked in various executive positions in technology and telecommunications and now focuses on editing and writing.

Motorola has been on a tear lately. Just last week it said that profits for the just-completed quarter were up 48%. That is quite a lift for any company. With the design and consumer icon Motorola RAZR still going strong -- the product has sold 50 million units in under two years -- what else does Motorola have up its sleeve. Plenty.

Motorola lost the #1 wireless phone manufacturer crown to Finnish rival Nokia a little over 10 years ago as digital wireless telephone networks were just being deployed. Motorola eventually lost its way, developed and released models that seemed disconnected from consumers and were boring and generic, and missed several opportunities under former CE Chris Galvin, a grandson of the founder of the company. Nokia missed one of the largest trends in wireless phones -- the flip-style handset -- and still managed to hang on to the top spot.

Now, Nokia probably has Motorola on its rearview mirror, as Motorola has gained incredible traction against its larger rival and most likely has the aim of unseating Nokia as the world's largest wireless handset maker. The popularity of the now-again Motorola RAZR made the company cool with consumers again, and Motorola has gone "thin crazy", releasing thin-style handsets to carriers all over the world -- and consumers can't get enough. The "slim style" craze caught all the other wireless handset makers off-guard, and everyone is now scrambling to keep with with the new style of wireless phone Motorola made so popular. MOT investors take note -- your company is on a climb to the top of Mount Everest. When it gets there, look for a fight to throw Nokia off the mountain.