On September 25, 1928, a company named " Galvin Manufacturing " was officially established at 847 Harrison Street in Chicago, USA.

The founder of this company, Paul V. Galvin, was a veteran of World War I. He started the business with his brother, Joseph Galvin.

Paul Calvin (left), Joseph Calvin (right)

Calvin's company was small, with only five employees and only $565 in operating funds.

However, it was this inconspicuous little company that gradually grew into a world-class communications giant with a market value of over 10 billion US dollars, leading the development of global communications technology.

That’s right, Calvin manufactured what later became the world-famous Motorola .

█Starting from a budding point, becoming famous in World War II

Before founding Calvin, Paul Calvin had many entrepreneurial experiences, but all ended in failure.

Galvin Manufacturing Company was founded by Paul Galvin on the basis of his previously failed storage battery company. He acquired the battery replacement patent of his former partner Edward Stewart and planned to continue to sell it and start a business.

Galvin's early product - battery replacement device

However, the Great Depression hit in 1929. Paul Galvin soon found that the company's inventory was increasing and its revenue was decreasing, and it was on the verge of failure again .

In desperation, Paul Galvin began to look for new market opportunities, and soon he set his sights on the car radio market.

At that time, radio broadcasting was becoming increasingly popular, and many people wanted to install a radio in their car so that they could listen to news and music.

However, all car radio products on the market have a problem, which is that they are easily affected by static interference generated by the car hood, causing noise.

Paul Galvin led the company's employees and, after careful research, solved the problem of static interference and launched a noise-free car radio product, which they named "Motorola" .

The name Motorola is made up of two roots: "Motor" means car, and "ola" means "sound", which together means "the sound of a car".

At that time, many brands adopted similar naming methods, such as the well-known Coca Cola.

Galvin car radio

After Motorola car radio was launched on the market, it was widely welcomed by users and sales soared.

By 1936, Calvin had sold 1.5 million car radios. At that time, more than half of the cars produced by Ford, Chrysler and other companies were equipped with Motorola radios.

In addition to mass-market car radios, Galvin also developed specialized radio receivers for police departments and city governments.

In 1936, the Galvin Corporation introduced an AM car radio called the Police Cruiser, which was pre-tuned to a specific frequency specifically for listening to police broadcasts.

Police Cruiser

In 1939, World War II broke out and the sales of car radios of Galvin Company dropped sharply. Paul Galvin decided to change the company's main product development direction from civilian to military.

At the time, the U.S. military was leading the development of military wireless communication equipment. In 1939, they created the first wireless backpack walkie-talkie, model SCR-194 .

After the SCR-194 was launched, it had many defects and was not suitable for battlefield use. Therefore, the military began to invite private enterprises to join in the research of the project.

And Calvin Company was one of the private enterprises invited.

The model that Galvin led the development of was the SCR-536 . The person in charge of the research and development at the time was the company's chief engineer Don Mitchell. Later, Daniel E. Noble , a top expert in the radio field, also joined them as the research director.

Daniel Noble (1901-1980)

After unremitting efforts, the SCR-536 wireless walkie-talkie was officially finalized in 1940 and put into mass production in July of the following year.

SCR-536

This walkie-talkie uses the AM band, weighs approximately 2.3 kg, has an operating frequency of 3.5~6MHz, and an output power of 360 mW.

Its effective communication distance is relatively short, only about 1 mile. It is worth mentioning that SCR-536 is the world's first handheld intercom device, also known as "handie talkie".

SCR-536

In the spring of 1942, Calvin introduced a new product - SCR-300 .

The weight of SCR-300 is about 14.5-17.5 kg, which is heavier than SCR-536 and needs to be carried by a special person. However, its effective communication distance is longer, reaching 3 kilometers .

SCR-300

The SCR-300 performed brilliantly in the Pacific and European battlefields, participated in a series of battles including the Normandy Landing, and was well received by Allied officers and soldiers.

SCR-300

During the entire war, a total of 50,000 SCR-300s and over 130,000 SCR-536s were produced.

These walkie-talkies with excellent performance made great contributions to the victory of the anti-fascist war. As a result, Galvin Company became a world-renowned radio equipment manufacturer with a global reputation.

█ Grow and develop, lead innovation

In 1940, in addition to military radio products, the Galvin Company also launched a civilian satchel radio device called the Motorola Sporter . This device has an antenna on the shoulder strap that can help people listen to the radio while walking outdoors.

Motorola Sport

In 1941, Calvin launched a small personal portable radio, priced at $19.95, named " Playboy ".

In 1942, Paul Galvin's family suffered a serious accident. Gangsters entered his Evanston home and killed his wife, Lillian Galvin .

The case was never solved. In 1943, the Galvin family chose to take the company public because of inheritance tax.

In 1944, in Cleveland, Ohio, the Galvin Corporation installed the first FM two-way communication system for taxis in the United States for the local Yellow Cab Co.

After the war, the Galvin Company installed the world's first complete AM two-way police radio communications system in Bowling Green, Kentucky .

On October 2, 1946, in Chicago, Illinois, Bell Telephone Company launched the world's first public car wireless telephone service and made the first call using Motorola communications equipment.

Paul Calvin and his car walkie-talkie

Since then, with the rapid popularization of its products, Motorola's brand influence has continued to expand and has gradually become synonymous with wireless communications.

In 1947, Paul Galvin simply changed the company's name to "Motorola, Inc. "

Also in 1947, Motorola introduced the first portable two-way radio for industrial use, as well as the first television.

This TV product was named " Golden View". Because of its low price, it was very popular among users, with sales exceeding 100,000 units in one year. Motorola also became the fourth largest TV manufacturer in the United States.

Motorola TV

In 1948, Bell Labs invented the transistor, which gave Motorola a great shock. Soon after, Motorola established a laboratory in Phoenix, Arizona, specializing in the research of new semiconductor technology. (Later, this became the base of Motorola's semiconductor business.)

In 1955, Motorola produced the world's first commercial high-power transistors for use in car radios.

In the same year, Motorola produced the world's first wireless pager (PAGER) . This small wireless receiver is compact, light, and easy to carry. It can receive messages and was initially used by users in hospitals.

Also in 1955, Motorola launched its iconic "bat wing" LOGO.

In 1956, Paul Galvin handed over the presidency to his son Robert Galvin . Two years later, Robert Galvin succeeded him as chairman of the company. From then on, Motorola entered the Robert era.

Later facts proved that Robert Galvin was an excellent successor with great management talent. Under his leadership, Motorola gradually became one of the world's top technology companies.

Robert Galvin is considered one of the greatest American industrialists of the 20th century

In 1958, Motorola launched the world's first duplex car walkie-talkie, Motrac , whose power supply and receiver were all made of transistors . Due to its low power consumption, this walkie-talkie can be used for conversations even when the car is not running.

Motrac car intercom

In 1963, Motorola and National Video formed a joint venture to launch the world's first truly rectangular color picture tube, which quickly became the industry standard. Before that, all TV screens were round.

1969 was another highlight moment for Motorola.

On July 20 of that year, the Apollo moon landing program was a success, and humans landed on the moon for the first time. Motorola radio equipment allowed more than 500 million people on Earth to witness this historic moment together.

Armstrong's classic quote: "That's one smallstep for man, one giant leap for mankind!" was transmitted back to Earth through Motorola equipment.

At that time, Motorola was the representative of the world's top communication technology and the leader of the global communications industry.

Motorola promotional poster

In the 1970s, civil public wireless communications began to enter a period of explosive growth. Motorola and Bell Labs (owned by AT&T) secretly competed to gain a competitive advantage in this field.

In 1973, Motorola engineer Martin Lawrence Cooper invented the world's first mobile phone, making his and his company's names famous in history.

Martin Cooper

Since then, Motorola has gradually stopped investing in consumer electronics and turned to high-tech electronic components.

In 1974, Motorola sold its consumer products division (including televisions) to Matsushita Electric of Japan. In the same year, Motorola launched its first microprocessor product, the MC6800 .

In 1979, Motorola launched an upgraded version of MC6800 - MC68000 .

This 32-bit microprocessor was very advanced, about half a generation ahead of its Intel counterparts, and became the most popular CPU for personal computers and small workstations at the time. Apple's first generation Mac used the MC68000.

After entering the 1980s, the Japan-US trade war entered its climax, and competition between the two countries' semiconductor companies also became fierce.

In order to consolidate the domestic market, Robert Galvin has been lobbying the US government to impose strict trade restrictions on the Japanese semiconductor industry. He also founded an organization called the International Trade Fair Alliance, which specifically persuades the government to impose high tariffs on foreign companies to reduce the US trade deficit.

The semiconductor competition continued until 1986, and Motorola did not gain any advantage.

Later, as China's reform and opening-up became more and more popular, Robert Galvin was keenly aware of the huge business opportunities in the Chinese market, so he led a team to China to invest. Motorola not only helped hundreds of Chinese suppliers to establish high-standard production lines , but also made a significant contribution to the modernization of China's communications .

In 1986, Motorola pioneered the famous Six Sigma (6σ) quality improvement process .

This process provides a universal quality assessment method that can ensure that 99.99966% of products have no quality problems. After its launch, it became popular all over the world and was adopted by many large companies such as General Motors, IBM, and Boeing.

In the mid-1980s, Motorola successfully developed the digital signal processor (DSP), becoming one of the three largest DSP suppliers at the time, along with Texas Instruments (TI) and AT&T. At this time, Motorola was at its peak.

In addition to semiconductors, the rise of cellular mobile communications has also helped improve Motorola's performance.

In 1984, Motorola introduced its first cellular wireless telephone system and the first commercial cellular mobile phone, the DynaTAC 8000X .

The phone was priced at $3,995 and supported 30 minutes of talk time. Although expensive, it was well received by the market.

In 1985, Motorola signed supply contracts in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and other parts of the world to help build the first generation of mobile communication networks (1G).

In 1989, Motorola launched the MicroTAC personal cellular phone, which was the smallest and lightest cellular phone on the market at the time and a classic.

MicroTAC 9800X

█ Lost my soul on Iridium, my dream was frustrated

In the mid-to-late 1980s, Motorola suffered a heavy blow, the well-known "Iridium Project" .

In the summer of 1985, Motorola engineer Bary Bertiger's wife was on vacation in the Caribbean and complained that she couldn't contact clients by phone.

So, a crazy idea popped up in Barry Berlinger's mind: Is it possible to use many satellites to form a global communication network and realize global calls?

According to the idea envisioned by Barry Berlinger and two colleagues, this could be achieved using 77 low-Earth satellites.

They also named the system "iridium", which is number 77 on the periodic table. Although it was later changed to consist of 66 operational satellites and 6 backup satellites in orbit, the name Iridium was still used.

Iridium Project

Although the "Iridium Project" was rejected by Barry Berlinger's supervisor, it aroused the interest of Chairman Robert Galvin, who believed that it was a great project and that Motorola's technology and financial resources at the time were sufficient to complete it and go down in history.

In 1997, the Iridium satellite project began to deploy satellites. In May of the following year, the deployment mission was completed. After investing $6.3 billion in real money, the Iridium satellite system finally turned from a concept into reality.

On November 1, 1998, the Iridium satellite project officially provided communications services.

Iridium satellite

Everyone is familiar with what happened afterwards. The Iridium project did not succeed, but quickly fell from grace.

At that time, the price of Iridium telephones was $3,000 each, and calls cost $3 to $8 per minute. Such high prices were prohibitive.

By April 1999, the entire system had only 10,000 users, far from the company's goal of 500,000 users. The company had to pay $40 million in loan interest every month.

only $3000.00 ...

In August 1999, Iridium filed for bankruptcy protection after defaulting on a $1.5 billion loan, less than a year before the Iridium satellite program was officially put into commercial use.

Many people believe that the Iridium project was the culprit for Motorola's decline, but this is actually not accurate. Although the Iridium project played a big role in Motorola's slide into the abyss, it was not the main reason.

The real reason lies in the mobile communications market.

█ One mistake after another, sliding into the abyss

As mentioned earlier, Motorola had an absolute monopoly in the 1G era.

However, the huge lead went to the heads of the company's management and employees. They began to become proud and inflated, and moved towards isolation and chaos.

At that time, people in Motorola's mobile phone department often lived a life of debauchery, while colleagues in the public security department worked very hard.

Motorola encourages a culture of internal competition and often offers huge bonuses to stimulate competition between departments.

As a result, internal struggles within the company became increasingly intense, and department heads could often be seen quarreling in the lobby.

The inside is changing, and the outside is changing too.

In the 1990s, communications entered the 2G era. Europe took the lead in proposing GSM, and mobile communications moved from analog to digital.

The focus of mobile communication technology development has also quietly shifted from the United States to Europe.

In fact, Motorola was not late in launching 2G GSM. In 1991, Motorola demonstrated the world's first digital cellular system and telephone prototype using the GSM standard in Hanover, Germany.

However, there were problems with Motorola's determination and strategy in digitalization.

Its mobile phone division and network division gradually became disconnected and headed in different directions of development. The network division firmly hoped to move from analog to digital as soon as possible, while the mobile phone division remained obsessed with analog for a long time because analog still contributed a lot of profits.

As a result, the network department began to abandon the mobile phone department and develop independently. There was even a period of time when engineers in the network department were using digital standard mobile phones manufactured by Qualcomm (Motorola's biggest competitor) for research and development testing.

In the early 1990s, Motorola's internal problems were masked by the performance growth brought by the hot sales of mobile phones.

In 1993, Motorola's sales soared 56% to $16.96 billion, and profits more than doubled to more than $1 billion.

The following year, in 1994, Motorola ranked 23rd in the Fortune 500 list, with revenue of $22 billion and profits of nearly $2 billion. That year, 60% of mobile phones sold in the United States came from Motorola.

Everything that goes up must come down, and Motorola began to go downhill after that.

During this period, a Finnish company gradually emerged and replaced Motorola's leading position in the mobile phone market. This Finnish company was Nokia , which later became very popular .

In 1998, Nokia officially surpassed Motorola to become the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer.

Motorola's semiconductor business, which it was proud of, also took a sharp turn for the worse. In the early 1990s, Motorola was the world's third largest semiconductor company, second only to Intel and Japan's NEC.

Later, PowerPC , a collaboration between Motorola, IBM, and Apple , was defeated by Intel's x86.

Motorola PowerPC

In terms of DSP, Motorola was also completely overtaken by Texas Instruments (TI), and Motorola Semiconductor gradually declined.

In 1997, Motorola's board of directors hired Robert Galvin's son, Christopher B. Galvin, as the company's CEO.

Chris Galvin

Chris Galvin was a talented MBA student at the business school, but his management ability was far inferior to that of his father, and he was unable to help the company out of its predicament.

In 1999, Motorola made its largest acquisition in history. It exchanged shares with broadband set-top box manufacturer General Instrument for $17 billion and turned it into its broadband communications division.

After the acquisition, Motorola's global employee headcount peaked at 150,000.

In 2000, shortly after the failure of the Iridium satellite project, the global economic crisis that followed dealt a heavy blow to Motorola, with the company's stock price falling by 40% at one point.

In 2001, Motorola's losses reached 4 billion US dollars. In desperation, Chris Galvin laid off 56,000 employees and closed several factories in an attempt to save the situation, but the effect was minimal.

In 2003, under pressure from the company's board of directors and Wall Street shareholders, Chris Galvin was forced to resign from the company.

Soon after, the Galvin family sold their 3% stake in Motorola (worth $720 million), and Motorola and the Galvin family had no further relationship.

█Blade Savior, a flash in the pan

After Chris Galvin left, he was replaced by Edward Zander , the former CEO of SUN .

Edward Sandel

At the beginning of his tenure, Ed Sandel commented on Motorola: "(This company) is not only developing slowly, but also has a messed up integration into future telecommunications technologies" and "I cried on my first day at work."

I don't know if he really cried, but I know that he must have laughed after a while.

Why is he laughing? Because his luck is much better than that of the former CEO Chris.

Before Chris left, the organization developed a new mobile phone, but he left before the phone was officially released.

Unexpectedly, this phone made Sandel a great bargain. In the first two years after the phone was launched, 50 million units were sold, directly helping Motorola turn losses into profits.

That’s right, this magical mobile phone is the famous Razr .

People born in the 70s and 80s should be very familiar with this, right?

Razr was so successful that it once became the world's best-selling mobile phone. With the help of Razr, Motorola's market value rose back to $42 billion, and it seemed that it could return to its peak.

Ultimately, though, the Razr was just a flash in the pan for Motorola.

Motorola did not seize the opportunity brought by Razr to recover, but indulged in the success of Razr and stopped making progress. The product department only changed the appearance and color. They did not take the opportunity to develop subsequent models and missed the opportunity to consolidate their advantages.

In addition to Razr , Ed Sandel also made a mistake by choosing to cooperate with Apple.

At that time , he was invited by Jobs to cooperate with Apple to launch a Motorola iTunes phone called Rokr .

Rokr

The phone can connect directly to the Apple Music Store, and Jobs called it "the iPod Shuffle on your phone."

No one expected that Apple's invitation to cooperate was just a cover. Its main purpose was to learn from Motorola's experience in mobile phone development.

Two years later, Jobs started a new business and launched the iPhone, which shocked the world and led the world into the era of smartphones.

It is worth mentioning that Motorola also made two major decision-making mistakes related to China .

The first mistake, as we all know, was missing out on acquiring Huawei .

In 2003, in order to make up for the shortcomings of its core network technology, Motorola planned to spend US$7.5 billion to acquire Huawei.

The negotiations reached the final stage, Chris left office and Sander took over.

Sandel did not realize the potential value of Huawei at all and thought that Huawei's offer was too high, so he canceled the acquisition deal. If Huawei had really been sold to Motorola at that time, it is hard to imagine what the current telecommunications industry would be like.

The second mistake was to ignore the importance of the Chinese market.

At that time, the Chinese market was gradually developing from 2G to 3G. Motorola's marketing staff in China did not launch 3G mobile phones that met market demand in a timely manner, but instead indulged in selling cheap 2G mobile phones.

Eventually, Motorola's market share in China was gradually eaten up by companies such as Samsung, and its market share dropped significantly.

█ At the end of the road , split and sold

In 2006, Motorola's global mobile phone shipments briefly climbed to 217 million units, accounting for 21.1% of the market share. Although this share is not as high as Nokia, it is far higher than Samsung, which ranks third.

By the second quarter of 2007, Motorola's mobile phone performance had fallen dramatically, with shipments falling by one-third and revenue falling by 40%.

Such poor performance attracted the attention of Wall Street. Wall Street investors, led by Carl Icahn , began to increase their holdings of Motorola shares.

Carl Icahn

Their goal of increasing their holdings is obviously not to help Motorola out of its predicament. What they really want to do is to split Motorola into several parts and sell them separately. Only in this way can they maximize their own interests.

On January 4, 2008, with the support of Carl Icahn, Greg Brown officially became the CEO of Motorola. Motorola formulated a strategy to separate the mobile phone department from the public security and enterprise departments and gradually implemented it.

In August 2008, also under Carl Icahn's arrangement, Sanjay Jha, an Indian executive from Qualcomm, became the co-CEO of Motorola, mainly responsible for the mobile phone business.

Sanjay Jha

During this period, a large number of Motorola employees and executives discovered that something was wrong, so they chose to leave the company and join Apple.

In fact, Sanjay Jha really wanted to do a good job in the mobile phone business. At that time , Google launched Android, and the Motorola board of directors thought that Microsoft's Windows 10 system should be used, but Sanjay Jha insisted on using Android.

Ultimately, the board voted 4:3 in favor of Sanjay Jha.

Sanjay Jha carefully selected 200 outstanding engineers and worked with Google's Android team to launch the Droid phone in October 2009 .

In the first few months of its release, the phone even sold more than the iPhone.

However, the good times did not last long. In 2011, huge pressure from its competitor Samsung caused Motorola's mobile phone division to go into deficit again.

After repeated failures, Motorola's funds gradually dried up, its talent was lost, and collapse was inevitable.

In 2010, Motorola sold its mobile communications infrastructure business to Nokia Siemens .

In 2011, Motorola was split into two companies: Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions .

The former mainly targets the mobile phone market, while the latter specializes in providing communication products and services to corporate and government customers.

Motorola's semiconductor division was spun off as Freescale in 2004 .

Freescale inherited all of Motorola's digital IC business as well as RF and sensor business, and has a complete product line in consumer electronics, medical, networking and automotive electronics.

In August 2011, Motorola Mobility was suddenly acquired by Google for $12.5 billion.

Now we know that what Google wanted was only Motorola Mobility's 17,000 patents. After the acquisition, Google immediately laid off 17,000 employees, retaining only 3,600 core employees.

Later, in 2014, Motorola Mobility was sold to Lenovo by Google at a discount price of $2.9 billion ( of course, Google retained most of the patents).

In March 2015, Freescale became a subsidiary of NXP. Soon after, in December 2015, the Freescale brand was officially discontinued.

In other words, nowadays , only Motorola System is still continuing Motorola's legacy .

In recent years, there has been very little news about Motorola Solutions. The biggest news was that in 2016, they acquired the British emergency communications company, AirWave , for a whopping $1.24 billion .

Conclusion

Today, the Motorola brand has long faded from people's sight. Except for occasionally releasing a new mobile phone to make its presence felt, it is almost difficult to see it anymore.

The once global leader in the communications industry has completely fallen.

Looking back at Motorola's rise and fall, there are factors such as changes in the external political and business environment, as well as the influence of internal culture and systems. The complex intersection of many reasons ultimately led to Motorola's decline.

In the face of the vast river of history, who can remain prosperous forever?

Perhaps, at a specific time, it is enough to play a specific role and play a specific role.

—— End of the article ——

All pictures in this article are from the Internet.