Lenovo, Motorola Mobility tie-up not meeting expectations

Lenovo Group essentially described its integration of Motorola Mobility as a learning experience and a work in progress in its latest financial report.

The Lenovo business unit that includes the Chicago-based smartphone maker had quarterly sales of $1.7 billion. The Beijing-based company said its shipments to markets outside China increased 63 percent to 51 million smartphones last year.

But shipments to the important Chinese market plunged 85 percent and the launch of the Moto G was delayed in the Americas, the company said in its financial report.

Motorola shipped nearly 5 million smartphones in the quarter and added $1 billion to its unit’s revenue.

“These results show integration efforts did not meet expectations.” the company said. “Lenovo has learned a great deal since the close of the Motorola acquisition and is applying learnings quickly, with actions in organization, leadership and approach.”

“Lenovo will maintain high growth in emerging markets and get the US business back on track with a competitive product portfolio.”

Overall, Lenovo posted a net loss of $128 million on revenue of $44.9 billion for the fiscal year. Revenue was down 3 percent from a year ago.

“We kept our core PC business strong, continuously improved profitability in enterprise and saw positive momentum in some key smartphone markets,” Yang Yuanqing, Lenovo chairman and CEO, said in a news release.

Lenovo bought Motorola Mobility from Google Inc. for $2.9 billion in October 2014 in a move aimed at making the Chinese computer maker a global smartphone brand.

Motorola Mobility, whose headquarters is in the Merchandise Mart, in late 2015 cut about 500 people, or 25 percent, of its Chicago workforce of 2,000. The cuts were part of an effort by Lenovo to shed 3,200 jobs worldwide.