Motorola Solutions CEO Greg Brown Makes Tough Calls To Thrive

Greg Brown, Motorola Solutions chairman & CEO, spoke with Investor's Business Daily about his vision for the company and its transformation into a global leader in safety and security.

Some CEOs eye a life of leisure after their companies are bought. Not Motorola Solutions CEO Greg Brown — he sought his next corporate challenge instead.

rown was living in Chicago when IBM (IBM) bought the company he was leading in 2003: Micromuse. But before the ink was dry on the buyout, he knew what he wanted to do next.

And what he saw was Motorola (later renamed Motorola Solutions), a former wireless communications champion in town struggling to evolve.

"I looked at Motorola as a challenged American iconic brand, but one that had a history of innovation and a long-standing, proud tradition,"

Brown, now 62, told Investor's Business Daily.

Brown figured that skills he picked up as Micromuse's CEO could apply to Motorola. But he had to get a job there first.

He wasn't a shoo-in for the job. He called Chris Galvin, a grandson of the founder, "and told him I wanted to join the company." Brown even knew the job he wanted — president of communications, government and industrial solutions. That was one of six divisions at the company.

But Galvin was skeptical. "He said, 'Why would you want to go from a public company CEO backwards to a division president?' I told him I don't look at it as backwards. Motorola is much larger, much more iconic. I look at it as a great opportunity," Brown said.

Brown got the job in 2003 and rose fast. The company promoted him to chief operating officer in 2007 and CEO the following year.

Great career advancement. But lousy timing. In 2007, Apple (AAPL) introduced the iPhone, which soon made Motorola's vaunted Razr flip phone obsolete. In 2008, the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy set the economy into a tailspin. And, in 2007, activist shareholder Carl Icahn purchased a stake in the company.

Brown didn't have good luck. But he had a plan. So in the first 90 days, he made several important decisions.

He fired the head of the cellphone business and got the board's approval to spin off the unit. That helped him reach an accord with Carl Icahn. On the surface, much of what Brown proposed was radical. In fact, there was no choice.

The cellphone business was "losing $300 million to $400 million a quarter," and because of that, "Motorola was on a path toward bankruptcy in two years," Brown said. So coming up with this solution wasn't difficult. But executing it was.