MOTOROLA PINS HOPES ON NEW RAZR

From Howard Wolinsky of the Chicago Sun-Times:

Motorola said Friday the next generation of its hugely popular RAZR thin clamshell phone -- one of the Schaumburg company's great hopes to spark a turnaround -- will be available from all major mobile phone carriers within 60 days.

RAZR2 will be available starting in the next two weeks. Tracey Thiele, Motorola spokeswoman, said that by October, the new RAZR2 will be sold by AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon, the top national carriers, and Alltel and Chicago-based U.S. Cellular, the regional carriers.

RAZR2 is part of a new product lineup, which Motorola hopes can turn around the company. Motorola, which invented the cell phone in 1973, has suffered a series of setbacks, dropping in the last quarter to No. 3 in the industry.