Despite profit, Motorola Solutions plans more layoffs, smaller campus
While Motorola Solutions Tuesday posted a second-quarter profit that tripled, it plans more cost-cutting measures that are expected to include layoffs and the sale of more land at its Schaumburg campus.
The company aims to increase its cost-cutting goal from $200 million to $300 million by late 2015, CEO Greg Brown told Wall Street analysts. He also held a town-hall meeting Tuesday with employees regarding the company's second-quarter earnings report and to answer questions.
Besides an unspecified number of layoffs, the company is proceeding with plans to sell more parcels of land at its 286-acre Schaumburg campus, which could lead to reduced maintenance costs and property taxes. It already has sold 39 acres for the new Zurich North America headquarters and 9 acres to the Illinois Tollway Authority for tollway expansion. Another 33 acres is up for sale as well.
In addition, the maker of wireless devices and networks for the public sector said it is developing a plan to improve its existing buildings, while it reduces its campus size, to make operations more efficient, spokeswoman Tama McWhinney said.
"We are looking at everything," McWhinney said. "This is our chance to reinvent ourselves and we're looking at all operations and processes."
Motorola Solutions posted second-quarter net earnings of $824 million, or $3.22 per share, from $258 million, or 94 cents per share, in the same quarter a year ago. Revenue was $1.39 billion, from $1.5 billion, or down 7 percent, from the same quarter a year earlier.
Last fall, Zurich North America announced it would build its new headquarters on about 39 acres on Motorola Solutions' campus. Stonemont Financial Group paid about $25.4 million to Motorola Solutions for the land and the existing building on the site. Zurich will be a long-term tenant. The existing parts building on the site was demolished and construction for the new Zurich headquarters is underway.
That set in motion the consolidation for the rest of the campus.
The Illinois Tollway Authority on July 25 paid Motorola Solutions about $3.1 million for 8.2 acres and obtained temporary construction easements for another 3.3 acres along the Jane Addams Memorial Tollway. It's for construction of a new interchange at Meacham Road that will provide access to and from westbound I-90, as well as related improvements, said Tollway Authority spokesman Dan Rozek.
Motorola Solutions continue to market about 33 acres and its accompanying 175,000-square-foot IT building for sale. The site and the IT building have been on the market since 2011.
Next, Motorola is seeking bids for ways to more efficiently use the land and facilities it now has. It will consolidate and modernize older buildings and improve short- and long-term operating costs, McWhinney said.
Motorola Solutions is selling its vacant and partially used buildings and land so those dollars can be reinvested in renovating its facilities, creating a better work environment, McWhinney said.
Also by the end of this year, Motorola Solutions will divest its Enterprise unit, which it sold to Zebra Technologies.
That also will include a departure of about 5,000 Motorola employees, out of about 20,000, who will join Zebra.