Zafirovski had been the president of the Personal Communications Sector at Motorola since June 2000, and he is the impetus behind Motorola's gradual comeback in the wireless handset market. He is holding dual positions until another PCS president is hired.

The 48-year-old executive moved to the United States in 1970 from his native Macedonia. He worked his way up the management ladder at General Electric Co., starting with GE in 1975. From 1982 to 1996, Zafirovski held a series of increasingly more senior positions with GE, including eight years as president and CEO of four businesses. Before arriving at Motorola, he was the president and CEO of GE Lighting.
Around Motorola, Zafirovski is known for his unending energy and disciplined work ethic, which has helped PCS take back some of the market share it lost to Nokia Corp. and rising wireless handset suppliers such as Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. Zafirovski was the third person in five years to hold the top spot at PCS. (Jones, 2000)

Motorola's wireless handset market share for the first six months of this year was around 18 percent, up from 16 percent for the same time last year.
Zafirovski's activities outside work provide further proof that he possesses almost unnatural energy.

He will have to move quickly if he's going to make good on his pledge to boost profits. Rivals Nokia and Ericsson AB of Sweden both issued profit warnings late last month, sparking worries that the fast-growing demand for cell phones could be starting to wane. (Motorola…., 2002)

Mike Zafirovski’s Main Strategies and Moves
Strengthening the Management

Zafirovski found that most of the top level managers were unable to take the burden of their posts and therefore, the company was going towards the loss. Zafirovski started weeding out those managers whose performance was worse. 10 % of the managers were weed out. The cell-phone unit has regained share since he replaced 11 of 19 top execs.

Development of New Products
Zafirovski came to know that Motorola will not be able to gain shares until it introduces new products in the market. Motorola's new products that are ranging from sleek camera phones to more powerful wireless semiconductors are grabbing share. Yet it still isn't a market leader in cell phones or wireless chips.

Reassessment of the Portfolio
The company continually reassesses whether it should stay in its six businesses. It failed to sell the wireless infrastructure unit in '02 and may try again next year if business conditions improve.

Cut Costs
Zafirovski understood that in order to gain the shares in the market, Motorola would have to cut down the work force. So he took the initiative and trimmed the workforce to 93,000 which is down 38% from 2000.
It's also closing factories and reducing the number of cell-phone platforms. This has raised gross margins to 33.1% in '02, from 26.7% in '01.

Lowering of Debt
With all these efforts, Zafirovski had been able to lower Long-term debt of $7.3 billion at yearend '02 down 13% from '01.
Motorola has positive cash flow, with $6.5 billion in the bank. (Crockett, 2003)

Revamping of Employees’ Bonuses
One of Mr. Zafirovski’s first moves was to get employees’ attention by revamping their bonuses. The 33,000 workers in Motorola’s cell phone business will have to reach new targets by the end of this year if they want to have extra money for the holidays.

Half of their bonuses will hinge on the cell phone unit’s reaching a 10% profit margin in the fourth quarter, from 4% now. Nokia has been making margins of 20%-plus on its cell phones. Mr. Zafirovski said that with the help of this goal, there are more chances to survive.

The remainder of the bonus will be tied to such basic goals as cutting product costs, improving market share, introducing new products on time and simplifying Motorola’s unwieldy stable of products. (Former General Electric…... 2000)
Motorola and Chinese Mobile-Phone Market.

Motorola set out to take advantage of growing markets and currently commands the top spot in China, the world’s biggest wireless opportunity. The company also made clear its software plans by dropping its stake in Symbian, teaming with Windows giant Microsoft Corp. and putting its weight behind a Linux/Java platform dubbed Motojuix (pronounced Moto juice). Analysts now believe Motorola plans to divide and conquer the world market by using Motojuix in Asia, Symbian in Europe and Microsoft’s
Windows in the United States.

Focus, industry watchers agree, is what Motorola needs to stay competitive in the worldwide mobile-phone market. China represents a huge opportunity for the world’s wireless firms, and the country’s handset market is particularly fierce. Motorola to date has managed to hang on to the top spot, but its position is eroding rapidly. (Hello, Moto; 2004)