The Fall of Motorola: Open Letter Details Tragic Missteps

Numair Faraz, who worked as former Motorola CMO Geoffrey Frost's personal advisor, gave Engadget permission to run a letter he addressed to the Motorola senior staff and its stockholders, chiding the executive staff for its complete mismanagement of the company. It's a barn burner.

Many close to Geoffrey believed Ed Zander worked him to death, putting the pressure of the fate of the company in his hands. [That was certainly the buzz around the industry at the time. -Engadget Ed.] I took his untimely death in 2005 very hard, and knew that the company would head downhill in the aftermath. On a personal note, Lynne, his wife blamed the company for his passing. She committed suicide soon after.

...

As I told Zander in a phone call in 2007, I felt that he was setting the company up for massive failure. He had the audacity to say, "Well, maybe Geoffrey should have come up with a better successor to the RAZR," and told me to "Wait for big things in 2008." I guess he was right -- the golden parachute he got for his exit from the company was worth about 30 million dollars -- and that doesn't include his accumulated Motorola stock.

Today Motorola announced that the company will be split in two in an attempt to offload its once-profitable mobile phone division.

Motorola insider tells all about the fall of a technology icon [Engadget]