Motorola Inc executives pledged on Friday to break the company out of its deep slump by rolling out a series of innovative new cellphones rather than a "one-hit wonder" like the Razr.
They had no new products to unveil at the company's annual analyst meeting in New York, however, promising some announcements next month.
On the defensive after a year of turmoil and subpar sales, Motorola's leaders said they were continuing to cut costs even with its share of the world handset market down to 14.6 percent from 21.9 percent a year ago, according to Gartner Inc.
The latest reduction is 15 percent to quarterly spending on research and development for mobile devices, which the unit's new chief, Stu Reed, said will make spending more efficient.
"We aspire to be No. 1 in market share," Reed said in remarks broadcast over the Internet. But, he emphasized, "we will not do it at the expense of margin."
Motorola's handset unit, its largest, has been struggling after more than two years of phenomenal Razr sales that fell off sharply starting last year. Earlier this year, the Schaumburg, Illinois-based company warned the cellphone segment would be unprofitable until at least next year.
The company has disclosed plans to trim 7,500 jobs and US$1 billion in costs as it tries to recover from a botched strategy of flooding emerging markets with cheaper phones to gain market share.
But it has yet to come up with a worthy successor to the Razr in a market now dominated by Apple Inc's iPhone. Motorola is in the process of introducing the Razr 2, although it is not expected to come anywhere near the success of the original phone.
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