Motorola Solutions to buy back $2 billion in stock

Motorola Solutions Inc., the maker of bar-code scanners and walkie-talkies, will buy back as much as $2 billion worth of its shares and begin paying a dividend after selling its networks unit and cutting debt.

Motorola Solutions will repurchase the stock on the open market or in private transactions through the end of next year, depending on market conditions. The Schaumburg-based company will start paying a quarterly payout of 22 cents a share in October, according to a statement today.

Chief Executive Officer Greg Brown said in an interview this month that returning capital to shareholders was a “priority” after the company sold its networks business to Nokia Siemens Networks for $975 million and reduced its debt by $540 million this year. Motorola Inc. became Motorola Solutions Inc. in January after spinning off its handset and set-top box businesses into a separate company.

Motorola Solutions fell $1.32, or 2.9 percent, to $44.32 yesterday on the New York Stock Exchange. Before today, the stock had climbed 19 percent this year.

Sales climbed 6.1 percent to $2.06 billion last quarter from a year earlier, the company said. Sales may rise 7 percent to 8 percent in the third quarter and as much as 6 percent for the full year.