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Here's the man who's leading Motorola starting today

Here's the man who's leading Motorola starting today

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There's a new person in charge of Motorola Mobility. Rick Osterloh has been named president and COO of the mobile company — which is in the midst of a sale to Lenovo. Osterloh takes on his new role immediately and will report to Google until Lenovo's purchase of Motorola is finalized and approved. After that, it's really anyone's guess how long he'll stick around. But at least for the immediate future, he's at the helm of the Moto X maker.

And according to outgoing COO Jonathan Rosenberg, Osterloh played a big part in the reinvention of Motorola that occurred under Google. "Rick is a Silicon Valley veteran and a familiar face across Motorola, where he has been leading all product management and helping to define the ‘go forward’ strategy for the past two years," said Rosenberg in a blog post announcing the change.

Osterloh is also credited as having "started Motorola down the Android path." "He’s been a guiding visionary on the entire product front and a passionate advocate for our philosophy to focus everything we do on the consumer experience," said Rosenberg, who will serve as an advisor to Motorola and liaison between the company and Google as the acquisition process carries onward. Osterloh takes control of Motorola at an interesting time; the company is months away from being handed over to a new owner, but it's also knee deep in development on innovative products like the Moto 360 smartwatch. Former Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside — who came to the company from Google — announced his departure in February. Woodside moved to Dropbox at the end of March.