Motorola (NYSE: MOT) shareholders may have felt a big relief when the handset company finally appointed Sanjay Jha to run the company and its struggling handset division, but they better not think they aren’t paying big bucks for someone of his caliber. The Wall Street Journal estimates that his compensation package may be worth as much as $94 million, including restricted stock, options, base pay and a special payment, reports MarketWatch. To put that in perspective that is nine times more than what he was making as Qualcomm’s (NSDQ: QCOM) COO and would make him one of the highest paid CEOs in the country, according to rankings compiled by Forbes. Most notably, however, is that Jha will be paid $30 million if the company does not spin-out the mobile devices business by Oct. 31, 2010 (as the company said it wants to do after being strong-armed by Activist Investor Carl Icahn). Given that the company’s goal publicly stated goal is to spin off the division by the end of next year’s third quarter, that’s a pretty cushy time frame. Still, MarketWatch points out that to offer him a $30 million bonus if the division doesn’t get spun out is contradictory. What’s the motivation if he is guaranteed $30 million for failing? However, it appears a compensation of this size was likely unavoidable given the challenges Motorola faces, and the kind of leader they were looking for.
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