Mobile application provider Motricity to lay off many of its workers

Wherever investor Carl Icahn treads, there’s usually turmoil.

Now, one of his companies, Motricity, a Durham, N.C. provider of mobile content applications for telecom carriers, is preparing to lay off up to 200 of its 650 employees, according to a North Carolina business publication WRAL.

We haven’t written about Motricity yet at VentureBeat, but the big-name investor Carl Icahn and other venture capitalists have pumped in more than $350 million into the company. The private Motricity is now considering going public.

Motricity acquired the mobile business unit of InfoSpace last fall for $135M, with Icahn, NEA and others providing the $185 million needed for the acquisition. The resulting employee overlap meant that the company would have to make layoffs, so they’ve been expected.