Motorola finally starting to get it. Should double from here.

by Kris_Tuttle on February 12, 2010

Yes­ter­day Motorola announced their plans to split the com­pany into two busi­nesses in 1Q2011. Essen­tially they will cre­ate a consumer-focused com­pany with mobile devices and home net­work­ing and another com­pany that han­dles enter­prise and gov­ern­ment prod­ucts and services.

We pub­lished an analy­sis of Motorola posi­tion­ing strat­egy that we had pre­pared for the com­pany in advance of their Jan­u­ary board meet­ings to resolve their long term plans for the com­pany. (avail­able via our research library but requires free reg­is­tra­tion and approval)

In the end the solu­tion that they came up with looks like a it has real poten­tial, espe­cially in the con­sumer space given what is hap­pen­ing with 1) mobile Inter­net and 2) Inter­net TV.

We already can see strong suc­cess for MOT in the mobile Inter­net space thanks to their Android-based strat­egy and what will be a full sta­ble of win­ning devices in the smart­phone space set to roll out this year. We’ve been talk­ing a bit about Inter­net TV (see this post from just yes­ter­day) and will soon be rolling out cov­er­age of the “con­nected car” as it too goes IP.

Motorola will be in a posi­tion to do drive some unique inno­va­tion in this new set of spaces. Cisco is strong in home net­work­ing but is at a dis­ad­van­tage to Motorola in mobile. Motorola will have a strong and poten­tially improv­ing posi­tion in both which will mat­ter as con­sumers will expect to be able to do sim­i­lar things between their mobile and home devices with their myr­iad content.

The enter­prise busi­ness will appeal to investors who are look­ing more for sta­bil­ity rather than growth and should fit well into GARP type port­fo­lios or per­haps value types depend­ing on where it trades as a sep­a­rate entity post the split. From a cov­er­age stand­point this part of Motorola will not likely be “our cup of tea” so after the split we will focus our efforts on the mobil­ity and home por­tion of the company.

It’s *way* too early to know enough detail to be pre­cise but based on our very early and rough analy­sis we have an IV for the mobile/home divi­sion of $12.50 and an IV for the enterprise/networks divi­sion of $6.25. How­ever even if we are only 1/2 right on the mobile/home divi­sion the stock is a dou­ble from here.

The gap between the cur­rent share price and what we expect exists for two major rea­sons: 1) Investors are very con­cerned about the prof­itabil­ity of the new mobile/home net­works divi­sion based on the his­tory of it at Motorola and the per­ceived untested nature of San­jay Jha as the CEO. 2) Motorola has a his­tory of bad man­age­ment and poor exe­cu­tion dur­ing the last ten years or so and some are call­ing this just more “mov­ing the deck chairs around on the Titanic.”

Our view on the risk reward is favor­able due in part to the mas­sive growth in mobile and home Inter­net which will put a strong wind at the back of Motorola man­age­ment in this space and the strong net cash posi­tion that helps to limit down­side from here.

[Dis­clo­sure: The R2 Model Port­fo­lio has a long posi­tion in MOT as a “spe­cial situation.”]

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