Ed Zander, CEO of Motorola (MOT) had a little tantrum this morning.
Motorola Chief Executive Ed Zander said on Wednesday he was fed up with rivals’ copying his company’s long-flagged product designs and vowed that from now on Motorola would announce products as it shipped them.
I’m not sure where Zander gets the idea that people are copying his phones. The slim RAZR has been a big hit, but what exactly has Motorola announced early and had someone else copy? Anyone? Maybe it was the recent rumor of the Apple (AAPL) iPhone and photoshop’ed product shots.
I think Zander wants to have slick, hip products product announcements like Mr. Jobs. No mention yet of a new black turtleneck wardrobe, secretive product announcements, and diabolical workplace behavior.
All my life in the computer industry we announced when we shipped
Mr. Zander was on the Board of Multilink and I would be generous saying they shipped a single unit of half of the products they announced.
I applaud Mr. Zander’s desire to announce only when shipped. Very few companies have been able to pull that off. Unless you are leading the market or releasing revolutionary products [ a bit like Apple ]you are usually behind the curve and need the release and subsequent publicity to stay ‘in the game’. There has been much more vaporware or slideware than actual product and the margin is wide.