Moto Z ‘likely’ to get Tango functionality via a new module, Lenovo SVP says

Lenovo launched the Phab2 Pro earlier this year (actually, it just recently started shipping) as the first Android “phone” to have support for Google’s Tango. I say “phone” because the Lenovo Phab2 Pro is basically a 7-inch tablet with cellular radios. Now, however, it looks like Tango might be coming to an actual phone in the form of a new module for the Moto Z…

In a press event today (via PCMag), Senior Lenovo VP and Motorola’s President Aymar de Lencquesaing said that Tango technology will “likely” come to the Moto Z.

“The tablet folks did a phablet and worked with Google, the Tango team, to come out with a Tango phablet,” he said. “Going forward, we’ll have to address as a group how do we reconcile the products that are at the fringe? We’re likely to to have a Tango module to basically enable the Z to have Tango functionality.”

This is good news for fans of the Moto Z (as I am, I reviewed the Moto Z Droid and Moto Z Force Droid earlier this year, and had mostly positive things to say). It means that not only is Lenovo not giving up on the Moto Mods — it’s doubling-down on them. One of my biggest gripes with the Moto Z is that the mods are too expensive and don’t offer enough useful functionality. Perhaps that will change.

Perhaps most excitingly, it sounds like — if this Lenovo VP is to be taken at his word — that Google isn’t quite giving up on Tango —or at least phone-based AR — either. So far Project Tango on the Lenovo Phab2 Pro (our review is coming soon!) has just been a novelty, with many of its apps only useful in niche cases, but perhaps that will change in the coming years. We can only hope.