Motorola sales fall as predicted

Though the SARS blight doesn’t seem as threatening to humanity as it did a few months ago, it did take its anticipated toll on Motorola’s second quarter sales figures. The company, which gets about 14% of its yearly revenue from China, reported a slip in overall second quarter sales of 10% from the second quarter of 2002.

The handset and infrastructure maker had warned a few months ago that the SARS outbreak would harshly impact its upcoming earnings. As it turned out, the quarterly revenue of $6.16 billion slightly beat some analyst estimates that were closer to $6 billion.

Looking ahead, Motorola Chairman Chris Galvin said the company expects a narrow improvement in third quarter earnings to about $6.4 billion, and a possible improvement in handset sales in China with the SARS threat having subsided. He also lauded recent growth in Motorola’s government and industry sales sector.

Still, Galvin remained somewhat bearish on the future, saying the Schaumburg, Ill.-based vendor would continue to eliminate some jobs in upcoming quarters, and did not see evidence that new industry-wide technology investment was picking up.—Dan O’Shea