Can Android Save Motorola?

Yesterday, Motorola (MOT) CEO Sanjay Jha announced that the company would introduce two Android-based smartphones by the end of the year, confirming rumors that Motorola was planning to use Google's (GOOG) operating system as the basis for its big gamble to once again become a presence in the handset market. According to ChannelWeb, Jha declared Android's third-party applications and extensive app "ecosystem" made it the ideal partner for its new forays into the world of mobile Internet devices. More interesting, of course, was what Jha didn't say: Microsoft. For the last few months, Motorola was rumored to be pursuing development deals with both Google and Microsoft. But when the time came to announce the new smartphones yesterday, Jha never once mentioned the software giant. And another big get goes to Google.

Even more interesting is the question of whether even a Google partnership will save Motorola's struggling handset unit. Once upon a time, Motorola's cell phones were ubiquitous, the very embodiment of mobile communications. But the company failed to follow up with new, innovative products; they have yet to introduce a phone with a touch screen, for example. And this has hurt them not just with consumers, but when trying to negotiate deals with cell phone carriers such as T-Mobile. Now, the company accounts for just 6 percent of the market, and its mobile phone sales fell 45 percent last quarter, when compared to the same period a year earlier.

According to PC Magazine, Jha put his company's prospects as euphemistically as possible: "We expect our second-quarter sales and units to be comparable to slightly down on a sequential basis. ... We are making important strides in operating as a more effective organization." Charter Equity research analyst Edward Snyder gave a more succinct summary to the New York Times: "They're stuck heavily in the handset death spiral."

Can Google keep Motorola from sinking beneath the waves? We won't know for about two years.