Unsurprisingly, Lenovo “product engineer” Ashton Kutcher is also doing online videos to promote Motorola. His last appearance demonstrated how people are incapable of not touching their phones. Now, Kutcher is talking with engineers and showing off features specific to Motorola phones.
A few months ago, as soon as it was officially launched in the UK, I checked out the Moto X Play. Price and spec-wise it stood halfway between the Moto G and the Moto X Style/Pure. Although it undoubtedly had its positives, there were some elements of the experience that left me disappointed. It intermittently stuttered and lagged during transitions, and very often refused to load data within apps. It wasn’t all the time, but it was enough to leave a less-than-great feeling.
With Android Marshmallow, the experience is so vastly different, it’s pretty difficult to believe. In fact, it’s so much better, I felt the phone should be revisited…
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Lenovo CEO Yuanqing Yang said today that the company will launch a new smartphone for the US in July, according to comments reported by The Wall Street Journal. Earlier this month at CES, the company announced that the Motorola brand name is actually being phased out around the world.
Best Buy offers the 2nd generation Moto X 16GB (unlocked) smartphone in black for $242.99 shipped, which is $57 below its retail price and the lowest price we could find for a brand new model. If you’re looking for its cheaper little brother, though, B&H offers the 2nd generation Moto G 8GB (unlocked) smartphone in black for $99.99 shipped w/ a free Belkin PowerHouse microUSB dock. That’s a savings of $95 compared to what these items would cost at retail…
Recently, Lenovo’s chief made some comments regarding the future of Motorola and Lenovo smartphones. Those comments seemed to indicate that the Moto brand name would only be used for high-end smartphones, while Lenovo’s ‘Vibe’ lineup would form the bottom end of the companies product portfolio. Some saw this as confirmation that Moto G and Moto E handsets would be discontinued.
Speaking to The Verge, a Motorola representative was quick to debunk those suggestions:
“Although we are simplifying the combined Motorola and [Lenovo] portfolio, we have no plans to retire Moto G, our most successful smartphone, or Moto E.”
Despite the fact that Lenovo’s chief seemed to be indicating an end to the bottom-tier Motorolas, it seems that instead, the Moto and Vibe brands will be used in different markets. The Moto G and Moto E are incredibly successful in a number of markets, particularly North America. In Asia, the Vibe brand is a better fit. So it could be instead that it slims down its portfolio, while still continuing to build new models of affordable Moto-branded products.
Most of the confusion and interest surrounding Motorola and its phones stems from a recent discovery that the Motorola brand name will be dying. Since then, it seems as though everything has been up in the air, at least in the media. While Motorola is going away, the Moto brand is too strong to give up. Just like it did with ThinkPad, Lenovo is going to continue using the Moto moniker for its devices.
If you’re still using a 2014 Moto X on Verizon, some good news has emerged today. A Motorola Forums Manager revealed today that the company will now allow bootloader unlocks for the 2014 Verizon Moto X, although it will still void the warranty.
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Update: Motorola has provided us with an official comment on the new branding.
In an interview with CNET, Motorola COO Rick Osterloh said that the storied Motorola brand will be phased out for Lenovo. Purchased by Google in 2011 and then sold to Lenovo in 2014, Motorola has had varying level of successes. While praised for stock Android, Moto devices on the high-end have not been successful in dethroning Samsung or LG.
Running up to the holidays, Motorola was offering some great discounts on its older Android and Android Wear products. Sadly, those same deals didn’t apply to the newer and rather fantastic Moto X Pure and Moto 360 from 2015. That changes this month, as the Lenovo-owned company begins offering money off for customers buying both products together.
Anyone buying the new Moto X Pure Edition (2015) and 2nd gen Moto 360 together will get $100 off at checkout. There’s no promo code to remember, just add the two products to your basket at Motorola.com in the US and the discount applies automatically. That means a package deal combining the two devices will cost you $599 for the base models, rather than the usual $699. Of course, adding extra storage to your phone or choosing a more premium material for the phone’s back or the Moto 360’s watch strap will cost extra.
This is the first time we’ve seen either of the new products with a significant discount anywhere in the US. The deal is available until January 12th, 10:59 Central Time.
Holiday season may have ended, but that doesn’t mean companies are ready to stop discounting products. We’re heading in to 2016, and have just seen an influx of new products hit the market in the last few months. That means older versions of gadgets are now available cheaper.
One such device is the original Moto 360. Head on over to Woot and you can snag the champagne gold version of Motorola’s first Android Wear watch for just $149 with either the 18mm or 23mm strap. That’s down 35% from the original list price of $229.
As a reminder, here’s a rundown of the specs:
The Moto 360 was arguably the first attractive, fashion-forward smartwatch running Android Wear. The champagne metal version emphasized that focus on design further. By the time the second generation was released towards the end of last year, Motorola had competition from the likes of Huawei, LG and Apple. Coming in to 2016, competition is only going to get fiercer as traditional watch-makers get involved in the wearable tech market. Both Fossil and TAG Heuer have launched Android Wear watches, and we expect other well-known fashion brands will do the same this year.
From 9to5Toys:
If you are looking for a last minute deal for Android-loving Christmas recipients, Amazon has matched the lowest price we’ve ever seen on the Marshmallow Nexus 6 phablet at $249.99 shipped in Cloud White or Midnight Blue.
Until very recently, this was Google’s flagship phone and it still has enviable specs and gets the first updates. Whether you use this as your main phone or a burner/development/extra/kids/parents phone, it still holds up very well and includes fast charging Micro-USB, a huge 6-inch display, front stereo speakers and much more.
You can get it with plenty of time for wrapping and putting under the tree. Prime will get it there by the 23rd.
If you want to got full bore, the 64GB is also available for $299.99, also an all time low. If you are after something smaller, grab the Moto X Gen 2 leather for the same price.
Of course, if you are looking for the latest and greatest, You can grab the Nexus 6P for $50 off here.
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Update: You can order the Star Wars editions of the DROID Turbo 2 from Verizon’s Motor Maker page from today.
With the upcoming premiere of the first Star Wars movie since the 90’s abominations we can’t mention by name, every brand on the planet is seemingly teaming up with Disney to produce their own Star Wars themed merchandise. Whether it’s LEGO, lampshades or mineral water, you can now get it with Star Wars branding all over it. Episode VII is launching in theaters next week, and Verizon and Motorola are the latest companies to jump on the bandwagon…
Motorola first announced its Android 6.0 Marshmallow rollout plans in October. At the time, 11 devices were included in the list that was mostly made up of devices from 2015 and 2014. One notable absence was the Moto E, the company’s entry-level smartphone. Thankfully, the list has since been updated and now includes the budget device, although if you have one in the US, you’re out of luck. The update seemingly won’t grace US shores.
Puzzlingly, Motorola has left the States and China out of its list of markets due to receive the Marshmallow update. The 2015 Moto E with 4G LTE will get Android 6.0 in Canada, Latin America, Europe and Asia (excluding China). Moto could still change its plans, and does state in the list that the China upgrade is still being evaluated, although no such statement is made about the US market.
Other handsets added to the list are those which were announced and released after the original list was published. As well as the Moto E, Motorola will bring Android 6.0 Marshmallow to the Moto X Force (which is currently part of a soak test), and the Verizon-exclusive DROID Turbo 2 and DROID Maxx 2. The full updated list of devices runs as follows:
Moto X Pure owners, rejoice! If you’re in the US and have the new 2015 Pure Edition running on Sprint, Verizon or US Cellular, you should find Android 6.0 Marshmallow landing on your phone relatively soon. David Schuster announced on Google Plus yesterday evening that the full rollout for those devices has begun…
We can’t escape Black Friday, it’s all over social media and the blogosphere. But what we can do is hopefully make it a little easier for you to find the best deals. This list won’t include any old Android phones that are discounted. There are plenty out there which we wouldn’t touch even if we’re shopping for a bargain. Instead, this list is only populated with devices we’d recommend buying and are now even better value for money than they’ve ever been.
Here are some of the best deals on great Android smartphones that we know of:
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Heads up! During Black Friday/Cyber Monday you’re going to have to follow us on Twitter to get the best deals since many sell out too quickly to post.
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Well-known designer Jonathan Adler has put together a new Moto X Pure Edition collection, all intended to capture the “spirit” of Moto Maker. The designs most definitely also have a holiday feel to them, so they might make a great gift if you know someone panning for the latest Moto X.
This holiday season, Motorola has something for every style lover on your list, including an all new Moto X Pure collection designed by the iconic Jonathan Adler. The limited-edition collection features three eye-catching, stylish phones that Jonathan felt captured the spirit of Moto Maker, our online phone design studio.
The collection will be available for pre-order at Motorola.com/JonathanAdler beginning November 24, and will officially go on sale December 3 for $474.99 (32GB). To help round out the rest of your shopping list, we asked Jonathan to share his top holiday gifting tips for the style-obsessed friends and family in your life.
Here’s what the three new phones look like:
In a clever new video, Motorola has proven — albeit while also advertising its Moto X — that we just can’t keep our hands off of our phones for as much as one minute. It’s perhaps not the most well-designed scientific experiment, but it’s interesting nonetheless the temptation we have to reach for our phones when they start buzzing, even in situations where we probably shouldn’t.
In this case, Motorola (or, more accurately, Ashton Kutcher) told unknowing victims that they were “running an experiment” that required them to keep their hands in two circles on a table. After they closed the door to leave the suspects in the room by themselves, they started sending notifications to their phones. As might be expected, the participants just couldn’t wait to check them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qUZai-kGgA
Motorola announced today that it’s beginning to roll out Android 6.0 Marshmallow starting with two devices in select markets. First to get the update is the 2015 Moto X Style (3rd gen) in India and Brazil and the 2014 Moto X (2nd gen) in Brazil.
I am happy to announce that we are starting initial deployment of the Android 6.0 Marshmallow upgrade for the following devices and channels: 2015 Moto X Style (3rd Gen) in both Brazil and India retail, 2014 Moto X (2nd Gen) in Brazil retail… It is not yet available for pull, you will receive a notification on your phone when you are able to update your phone
In addition to the two devices mentioned above, Motorola says it will begin to rollout the update for the 2015 Moto X Pure Edition (3rd Gen) in coming weeks. It also confirmed that a “full deployment will proceed in stages over the next few weeks.”
Motorola offered a breakdown of some highlights in the update:
– A new Memory Manager that lets you check memory usage of all your installed apps
– Volume controls have been greatly improved
– Do not disturb button has been added to the quick settings panel for easy access.
– System UI Tuner will appear in the settings menu at the very bottom once enabled. It provides a few simple UI tweaks.
– Google Now on Tap allows contextual information to be delivered based on content on your screen with a long press of the home key.
– Doze is a battery management feature that detects when your device is not in use and it will automatically go into a deep sleep state which saves your battery.
– App Standby reduces battery drain by putting seldom-used apps into a reduced activity state.
– Expandable Storage support allows for microSD cards to be used either in a portable storage or an internal storage mode. Portable storage allows your pictures, videos, audio and other media files to be stored. Internal storage allows both media storage along with apps and games but can not be used by other devices.
– RAM manager in settings which allows a consumer to view memory used by the system or an individual app over different time frames
– Automatic App backup not only backs up your apps but their associated data so when restored they will be the same as they were before
– Text selection has been improved
The company has full release notes for the update on its website here.
Despite a 16% year-on-year growth of revenue to $12.2 billion, Lenovo has just announced its first quarterly loss in six years. In its fiscal Q2 earnings results, the manufacturer blames both the competitive nature of the smartphone market and the restructure following its finalized Motorola acquisition for its losses.
Before tax, Lenovo lost around $324 million on unsold smartphone inventory and $599 million to “restructuring costs”.
The official HKFRS losses were driven by the realignment plans Lenovo disclosed during its Q1 results, including worldwide expense reduction actions across all businesses, the integration of the System x Business, the organization and brand alignment of Motorola and the Lenovo Mobile Business Group and clearance of smartphone inventory.
It’s not entirely bad news for Lenovo though. The addition of the Motorola brand has meant the company saw a year-on-year sales increase of 104% of in its Mobile Business Group. It sold $2.7 billion worth of smartphones, Android tablets and TVs. $1.4 billion of those were Motorola sales. Most of this growth is down to sales outside of China. Across the first two quarters of its financial year, 70 percent of its mobile products were purchased outside Chinese borders. This time last year, that figure was just 19 percent.
Unlike the rest of the tablet industry, Lenovo’s sales actually grew, selling 18.8 million units, up 11 percent from last year.
Despite making a loss last quarter, Lenovo is convinced that the mobile division will return to money making ways after the next couple of quarters. With the rise of competitive and affordable products from other brands, it’ll be a tough challenge. But, with the likes of the Moto G, Moto X and new DROIDs in its lineup, the company certainly has the hardware to compete. What’s more, it just opened its very first boutique retail store in Chicago to help boost high street presence.
Motorola debuted two new phones at its event back in the summer, the Moto X Style (or Pure in the US) and the Moto X Play, which recently saw release as the DROID Maxx 2 in the States. Since I’ve already reviewed the X Play, I wanted to see if the X Pure/Style would be worth the extra money to customers looking to buy…
CORRECTION: Motorola got in touch with us to say that the Turbo Edition, like the regular Moto G, has a 720p screen. So, not quite as tempting for the bump in price.
Over the past few years we’ve seen a rise of affordable smartphones offering a great experience to buyers. The original Moto G was, arguably, the phone that kicked it off, right at the bottom end of the market. This year, we saw the arrival of the 3rd generation which still offers a lot of bang for your buck. In Mexico, Motorola just released an even better model. It costs a little extra, but looks like it’ll easily be worth the outlay…
Motorola is opening its very first physical retail store later this week. Moto Shop, as it’s called, is opening in downtown Chicago, the company’s hometown, on Saturday, November 7, in time for holiday shopping to begin. In its blog post, the company notes that because smartphones and wearables have made powerful technology more personal, you should be able to go and experience them fully, in real life. Moto wants to make the shopping experience as personal as it can…