Icahn becomes third largest Moto shareholder

Corporate raider and billionaire investor Carl Icahn has increased his personal holding in US device and kit manufacturer Motorola, to 3.3 per cent.

This makes him the third largest stakeholder in the company behind investor Dodge & Cox and Capital Research & Management.

The move could put further pressure on Motorola CEO, Ed Zander, to turn the troubled company’s handset unit around.

In the past, Icahn and Zander have had very public bust ups over the performance of the company. Icahn has previously sought a seat on the Motorola board and even called for Zander’s resignation.

Last month, the company posted its first profit in three consecutive quarters. The bad news was that profit was down 94 per cent year on year.

Moto recorded a net profit of $60m for the third quarter, down from a profit of $968m in the same period last year. Sales were also down from $10.6bn to $8.8bn, dragged down by the handsets division, which recorded a 36 per cent drop in revenues.

During the quarter, the Mobile Devices unit shifted 37.2 million handsets, including 900,000 RAZR 2 devices. The company also introduced the Moto U9 music device, yet another edition of the RAZR 2, seven W-Series handsets and the iC602 dual-mode iDEN/CDMA device. The company also introduced an ultra high speed WiMAX chipset.