Motorola to split in two in January

(Courtesy of Motorola)

Motorola on Tuesday announced it will split in January into two companies, one focusing on cellphones and Internet and the other on professional equipment, in a bid to boost its performance.

The telecommunications equipment giant said it would split into Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011.

Motorola shareholders will receive one share of Motorola Mobility for every eight shares of current Motorola shares they hold, the Illinois-based company said in a statement.

"Today's announcement marks another important milestone toward the upcoming separation that is expected to benefit Motorola, its stockholders, as well as each company's respective customers and employees," Greg Brown and Sanjay Jha, Motorola co-chief executives, said in the statement.

Brown is the future CEO of Motorola Solutions and Jha is CEO of Motorola Mobility.

"We look forward to taking advantage of the opportunities before us as we begin the new year as two independent, publicly traded companies," they said.

Motorola Mobility will focus on the media, mobility, Internet and computing markets while Motorola Solutions will target next-generation communications solutions to government, public safety and enterprise customers, it said.

On January 4, Motorola will change its name to Motorola Solutions and will begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol MSI; Motorola Mobility will trade under MMI.

Motorola shares were up 0.1 percent in after-hours trading.