Motorola's ex-CEO got $7.3 million
Former Motorola Inc. Chief Executive Ed Zander received $7.3 million in compensation from the company in 2007, according to a proxy statement filed Wednesday, for a year that saw the cell-phone maker lose money, sales and market share and ended with his resignation.
Zander's $1.5 million salary remained the same but his overall compensation fell 45 percent from 2006 as the amount received from stock options and restricted stock fell by more than $6 million to $3.46 million.
His compensation package also included $1.49 million in cash awards under the company's incentive plans and $826,255 in perquisites -- nearly double the amount of a year earlier. The company said those perks consisted of personal use of the company aircraft and a company car as well as financial planning and spousal business travel.
Zander stepped down at the end of the year under pressure from investors after a disastrous stretch that pushed Schaumburg, Ill.-based Motorola into third place in the global cell-phone market and caused it to lose $49 million for the year.
He was succeeded on Jan. 1 by Greg Brown, who received $9.7 million in compensation from the company last year as president and chief operating officer, including $8.3 million in stock options and restricted stock.
Motorola is fighting a proxy battle with Carl Icahn for the second straight year after prevailing a year ago.
The billionaire investor, who has been steadily increasing his Motorola position, disclosed in a separate filing that he now owns 142,362,000 million shares, or 6.3 percent -- up from 5 percent a month ago.
Icahn has nominated former Viacom Inc. CEO Frank Biondi, WR Hambrecht & Co. founder and CEO William Hambrecht, MIT professor and semiconductor materials processing expert Lionel Kimerling and Icahn Enterprises CEO Keith Meister for Motorola's board.
He has said they are necessary to "help insure that the board moves aggressively" on its "long-overdue" strategy to separate the phone unit from its other businesses. Those businesses are enterprise mobility solutions, which makes public-safety radios and bar-code scanners, and home and network mobility, which makes cable television equipment and gear for cell phone carriers.
Motorola urged its shareholders in the filing to not vote any proxy sent to them by Icahn or his affiliates.
Shares in the company rose 9 cents to $10.02 in Wednesday trading. The stock is down 46 percent from a year ago.