Motorola Mobility plans to shed 800 jobs as it prepares for a buyout by Google, which offered $12.5 billion for the company in August. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Motorola said the sale is expected to go through by the end of this year or early in 2012. Motorola Mobility is the slice of Motorola that designs and makes phones and set-top cable boxes. The cuts are expected to take place globally, with 185 positions eliminated in its home state of Illinois. Some of those to be cut are involved in projects in the other side of the business, Motorola Solutions, which focuses on products for business customers. In the filing, the company said uncertainty created by the buyout has made it harder to attract and retain employees, intensified litigation over intellectual property and led to increased competition, InfoWorld reports. These cuts are just the latest in a series. Before Motorola split its business in two earlier this year, it eliminated 3,000 jobs in 2009 and around 1,000 in 2010. About 700 people have been let go so far this year. Motorola Mobility reported it had cut its losses in the third quarter to $32 million. One analyst, however, predicts the company could be sold again. Ed Snyder of San Francisco-based Charter Equity Research,  said in a research note Friday that Google's interest is more about mobile advertising than building phones. He believes Google can’t afford to alienate its larger Android partners, such as Samsung, LG and HTC:

Google bought Motorola for its patents, not for its hardware operations, which wouldn’t contribute enough in revenue or profits to offset the risk. We therefore expect Motorola to be spun or sold again in the not-so-distant future.