NEW YORK, USA: Motorola Inc posted a quarterly profit versus a year-earlier loss as it sold more smartphones than Wall Street estimated even as overall phone sales declined faster than expected.

The company's shares rose 3.2 percent after it posted a first quarter profit of $69 million, or 3 cents per share compared with a loss of $231 million or 10 cents a share in the same quarter the year before.

Revenue fell to $5.04 billion from $5.37 billion the year before and compared with average expectations for $5.098 billion, acccording to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Motorola, which is reorganizing the entire business around smartphones based on Google Inc software, said it sold 8.5 million phones compared with expectations for 10.2 million from nine analysts contacted by Reuters and 14.7 million phone sales in the same quarter a year earlier.

But the company said its sales of smartphones rose to 2.3 million from 2 million in the fourth quarter, when it was helped by its Droid phone, which is sold at Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications and Vodafone Group Plc.