Motorola lost two and a half billion pounds last quarter.  That’s 2.5 GIGApounds.  When your loss figures need scientific notation to represent how much money you no longer have, you may be doing something wrong.  Or put another way, CEO Sanjay Jha could have toured England in a rocketship powered by burning three hundred pound notes a second and still not lost as much money.

Said CEO remains committed to the mobile market, saying “We are completely committed to making the handset business work, this is shared throughout organization.” A pity no-one told the market, or indeed the organisation: Motorola’s device sales have fallen fifty percent since last year, and their number of Chief Financial Officers dropped by a hundred percent with previous post holder Paul Liska making his escape.  When the guy whose job is “Look at the money” runs away it may be some kind of warning sign.