Motorola Droid: Resurrection or last breath of a former giant
Motorola used to be a major player in the telecommunications market. But for quite some time, the phones have been way off from competition such as the iPhones, LGs, Samsungs, Nokias and Blackberrys. Gone are the days, when the RAZR was state of the art in mobile phones business. Motorola harvested the RAZR trend as long as possible with similar models such as the RAZR V3 V3i, the KRZR, or the ROKR. But the market went a different direction. Today, Motorola is heavily loosing ground in the mobile device market. And as it is the devices and not the carriers who attract new customers or or maintain customer retention, Motorola phones have become fairly unattractive for the AT&Ts, Verizons, T-Mobiles and Vodafones.
Many experts already see Motorola devices dying out. But Moto returned, with the Droid.
Motoroal Droid open
With what today almost seems like a joker: Google Android. When your phones simply does not have what it takes anymore, you still have the opportunity to switch to a phone OS that has all it takes to become attractive: innovativeness, sympathy, performance, and so on. Google Android offers all that and in many eyes easily passed Microsoft’s Windows Mobile: it simply isn’t sexy.
But let’s get back to the Droid. According to industry experts, the Droid aims to be another iPhone-Killer. IT has the innovative Android OS, it looks good and it is backed by an obviously successful marketing campaign. The result could be seen in people lining up Thursday midnight in Manhattan to be among the first to get the new Moto. Verizon the carrier of the new Moto opened its Manhattan store from midnight till 2 a.m. for the earyl innovators eager to purchse the phone a little before the other potential buyers. So far this was a success. According to CNET news, more than a hundred people lined up in the middle of the night in front of the store opposite of Macy’s.
Well thats the usual procedure we know from the Sony PS3, the X-Box and so on. But what is the phone really capable of? This will decided about its long-term success in this tough market. And this has also been what made the iPhone so successfull: design, image and performance. Moto lacks the image or the strong brand if you want, may not be as stylish as the iPhone (Apple-mania) but may be performant due to the Android OS.
Here are some expert voices:
Engadget: “The DROID is an excellent smartphone with many (if not all) of the features that a modern user would expect, and if you’re a Verizon customer, there probably isn’t a more action packed device on the network.”
Boy Genius Report: “We absolutely love the Motorola DROID. It’s a perfect storm between awesome hardware, great software, and a great network. That’s not to say it’s for everyone. It isn’t the most consumer-friendly device off the bat and it’s going to take some time and a whole bunch of improvements before we think Android (Android) can totally compete in the consumer space like others can.”
Gizmodo: “It’s this simple: If you don’t buy an iPhone, buy a Droid. It’s the best phone on Verizon, and with Android 2.0, the second best smartphone you can buy, period. It’s flawed, deeply in some ways. But it’s the second best phone around, on the best network around.”
David Pogue (The New York Times): “Since Verizon seems to want a Droid-iPhone faceoff, here it is: the Droid wins on phone network, customizability, GPS navigation, speaker, physical keyboard, removable battery and openness (free operating system, mostly uncensored app store). The iPhone wins on simplicity, refinement, thinness, design, Web browsing, music/video synching with your computer, accessory ecosystem and quality/quantity of the app store.”
Walt Mossberg (The Wall Street Journal): “The Droid is potentially a big win for Verizon, Motorola and Google (Google), as well as for loyal Verizon customers.”
CNet: “Some minor design issues and multimedia quibbles aside, the Motorola Droid is the most powerful and fastest Google Android device to date. It fully embraces the openness of the Android platform and offers Verizon customers a smartphone that certainly rivals the other touch-screen devices on the market.”
LA Times: “We’re getting this out of the way now: Motorola’s Droid is the best Google phone on the market. Here’s another one: Droid is the best phone on Verizon.”
(Source: http://mashable.com/2009/11/05/verizon-droid-metareview/ )
But aside of all expert voices, what counts is sales. Let’s wait and see if former mobiel giant Motorola will find back to old strengths or whether it will die a quick death in this highly competitive and fast changing market.
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