Hewlett-Packard executive Todd Bradley has been named as the likely contender to take the top job at Motorola's handset division, reports the Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the matter. The paper said that there are two people in the short-list and that negotiations are at a "sensitive stage" - typically meaning issues about pay and stock options.

Mr. Bradley however says that he isn't planning to leave Hewlett-Packard. "I'm happy where I am, and I'm not planning to make any changes," he told the newspaper.

According to his bio on the HP corporate website, Todd Bradley is currently the executive vice president of HP's Personal Systems Group, a $28 billion annual business that includes personal computers, mobile devices, technical workstations, digital televisions, personal storage solutions and Internet services. Bradley also has responsibility for HP's volume sales motions, both through commercial channels and direct to customers, as well as the company's strategic focus on the growing mobility market.

Prior to joining HP, he was the chief executive officer of palmOne.

It is worth commenting that early last year Motorola's President of Mobile Devices jumped ship to head up the Global Consumer division at Dell Computers. Since then though, Dell has lost market share to HP and according to figures from Gartner, HP overtook Dell as the world's largest supplier of consumer computer products late last year. For Motorola, securing the man most responsible for that result would be quite a coup, and possible shadenfruede for the company which lost its mobile head to the company which HP then overtook.

Source: Wall Street Journal