May 30 (Bloomberg) -- Motorola Inc., the world's second- biggest mobile-phone maker, will eliminate 4,000 jobs, the second round of firings this year as it works to return to a profit.

The move, along with lower general and administrative expenses, will help save an additional $600 million a year starting in 2008, Motorola said today in a statement. The company said it expects costs of $300 million, or 8 cents a share, in the remainder of this year tied to the latest cuts.

The reductions represent about 6 percent of Motorola's total workforce at the end of 2006, and come on top of 3,500 job cuts announced in January. Schaumburg, Illinois-based Motorola posted its first loss in almost three years in the first quarter as competitors Nokia Oyj and Samsung Electronics Co. won market share with new devices.

``They're doing the right things,'' said William Choi, a Jefferies & Co. analyst in New York who rates the shares ``hold'' and doesn't own them. ``It doesn't solve the main problem they currently have, which is to strengthen their portfolio of handset products.''

Shares of Motorola rose 17 cents to $18.45 in extended trading. They slipped 2 cents to $18.28 at 4 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading and have lost 11 percent this year. Nokia, based in Espoo, Finland, has gained 30 percent, and Suwon, South Korea-based Samsung has declined 13 percent.

Under Fire

Chief Executive Officer Ed Zander has come under fire from investors for not moving quickly enough to revive the mobile- phone business. He is rolling out new products and focusing on profit, instead of chopping prices to win back market share.

``Long-term, sustainable profitability is -- and always has been -- Motorola's top priority,'' Chief Financial Officer Tom Meredith said in the statement.

Motorola said the January firings, which mainly affected middle managers, will be completed on schedule by June 30. The company, which had 66,000 workers at the end of 2006, plans to save $400 million a year with the original cuts.

The company said separately a count of shareholder votes confirmed that billionaire investor Carl Icahn failed to win a seat on the board. Icahn, who criticized management, won 717.1 million votes, compared with 931.7 million for John White, who has been on Motorola's board since 1995.

A non-binding proposal to give shareholders a vote on executive pay, which the board had opposed, won 51.8 percent of votes, Motorola said.

Razr2

The company's profit margins shrank last year amid price- cutting to make up for a lack of successful products to replace its best-selling Razr phone, which is more than two years old. The loss at the handset unit was $231 million excluding some costs last quarter. Revenue from phones fell 15 percent to $5.4 billion as sales slipped in emerging markets and in Europe.

In the first quarter, Zander stopped lowering prices to preserve profit. The strategy backfired as Motorola lost sales, partly because its phones weren't competitive, according to Boston-based researcher Strategy Analytics Ltd.

The company on May 15 said it will start selling a successor to the Razr in July in a bid to fuel demand. While the Razr2 and other products unveiled this quarter will help Motorola return to profit, they aren't enough to stem further market share losses in the second half of the year, according to analysts including Piper Jaffray & Co.'s T. Michael Walkley.

The market share gap between Nokia and Motorola widened to its largest in more than three years in the first quarter, Strategy Analytics said. Motorola's market share slid to 18 percent, while Nokia's share widened to 36.2 percent. Nokia on May 14 said its market share will increase in the second quarter.

To contact the reporters on this story: Ville Heiskanen in New York at vheiskanen@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: May 30, 2007 18:21 EDT