Earlier this year Kyocera acquired Sanyo's global mobile phone business and during the past few weeks the Company is believed to have opened up discussions on the possibility of merging the Motorola phone business into the new Kyocera division.
Sources in Japan have told ChannelNews that Kyocera believe that their manufacturing skills coupled with Motorola's marketing skills will help them to create a "Powerful " phone division to take on the likes of Samsung and LG who during the past few months have taken significant market share away from Motorola in the highly competitive US market.
Late last year Motorola admitted that it was exploring options for its troubled handset division, yet despite their frank and public admissions that there was trouble ahead, no one came forward with an offer to bail out the troubled US Company.
According to BusinessWeek the lack of acceptable bids has added renewed urgency to Motorola's backup plan: an in-house revamp. Improved performance would help Motorola sell the division at a more attractive price later, spin off a higher-value asset, or even hang on to a revitalised handset maker.
