Motorola may stop making cellphones after all its customers bought iPhones and Samsung phones. [Bloomberg]
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Im actually sad about this. As bad as the UI was, they where the only third party phones on Verizon that synced well using Apple isync, and I actually liked the look. Guess I need to get new chargers and everything now come next phone
Waaaah! I’m taking my ball and going home!
Hey, here’s another idea. Make your phones BETTER so that they can compete with other companies’ products.
Fewer companies cometing and driving innovation can’t be good for consumer choice.
I love my Motorola phone. It’s not a fancy touchscreen mp3 wonder, but wow does it have a long battery life and sounds great and doesn’t drop calls.
I love my motorola phones that have had. The last 4 phones I have had have all been Motorola phones and they are by far the best quality ones I have had. I have tried Nokia and Samsung phones, and LG and their reception is terrible. The only one who ever got good reception down in our IT office was my Motorola phone.
@savvy999: Damn, I wish my last three Motorolas had been like yours, their battery life sucked, they sounded awful, they dropped calls like you wouldn’t believe and the user interface sucked beyond belief.
That said, my Treo isn’t exactly filling me with joy either. It may be coming time for an iPhone, to be honest.
@theirishscion: Now I think about it, the last phone I had that I really really _really_ liked was a Nokia 2110. Happy days.
That and everyone who’s had a razr break isn’t going to get another one.
@JMH: I agree. Part of the reason Apple is so successful is they: 1) Have strong R&D 2) Push innovation and 3) Take chances (yes 2 and 3 are nearly the same). Motorola did that for a short time with their Razr. Then they got lazy and greedy. Do they honestly think they can keep re-releasing the Razr and continue lead the pack? Seriously, how stupid do you have to be? This one blows my mind, because there’s guy making mid/upper six figures who’s only idea is to re-release the Razr. Then they have the temerity to act surprised when sales drop.
Pretty sure spinning off its phone unit isn’t the same as ceasing production.
I love my Motorola W385.
I got a PEBL two years ago and the ringer/speaker stopped working after less than a year. Just – no sound. Now I have a Samsung.
@LVP: That’s what I have! Compared to the big honkin’ Sprint-badged anchor I lugged around for years, my little 385 (through Verizon) is a dream come true.
@HRHKingFriday: YES!
@ARP: You’re dead right about the razr bit. The phone was great in it’s day, but now it’s just an old phone. Update it all you want, owners are still carrying a vintage phone. I loved my original Razr and used it for years, only problem I had was the processor was too damn slow, so digging through the phone book was painful. Otherwise, great phone.
I upgraded to a Motorola E6 recently. It’s as close as you can get to a Motorola “iPhone” – full touch screen, Linux smartphone. I love it. It’s a great phone in every way.
The one thing Motorola really nailed was the use of mini-USB for everything. If they really stop producing phones, the first company I can find making decent phones that use mini-USB chargers & data connections is going to get my business. I specifically excluded a lot of phones from consideration on my last purchase because of this. USB is a standard charging & communications mechanism and when I see a company using proprietary connectors, I think, “What greedy assholes.” I’m not replacing all of my chargers and data cables again if I can help it.
That’s ironic. I’ve been using Motorola phones for years and have
been thinking about switching over to Samsung. The thing that I didn’t
like about my last phone involved software glitches when it was
connected to a computer; eventually the phone and computer would stop
communicating and there was no way to get them going again short of
starting over from scratch. Maybe that’s been fixed in a recent
software update, I don’t want to replace my phone quite yet anyway.
Dammit, I bought my V325 almost 2 years ago and I absolutely love it, all I have had to do was replace the battery on it, and you can find cheap batteries online.
My ex had a Samsung, and it was a piece of crap, he went through 3 of them in one year. I would not buy one.
I like Motorola phones. I’ve had nothing but Motorola phone since the analog days. But over the years, they’ve been pretty clueless. Stale phone designs, lack of features, and poor marketing. I mean, come on.. how many variations of the Razr are they going to make? Instead of bringing out new phones, they just repackage their existing phones but offer it different colors. Very disappointing.
So overall I’m not surprised with this news. But after reading the article, I really couldn’t tell if they’re going to stop making phones completely, or branch off and become a separate Motorola Mobile Phone company.
Motorola should focus on phones that emphasize, y’know, talking on the phone. Just that. No bells and whistles. Or not many. It seems in the mad rush to smarter and richer phones, this segment is being ignored. If they came out with a series of well-designed and pretty phones that did this, they’d have a nice niche. They’ve done it before, and they can do it again.
Three out of four of us in our family have low-end Motorola phones and sorry, they just suck. Mine turns itself off whenever it feels like it, just the feature I need as the mom of two. It’s not the battery, it’s the phone because when I turn it back on the battery shows a full charge. My son’s Motorola disconnects all incoming calls right after he says hello and he has to call you back. We’re not due for new phones until August. We’re willing to pay this time to get something decent, since my oldest will be heading off to college, any suggestions?
I love Motorola phones. I’ve had several in my life. My favorite phone to date, however, is a Samsung. Had MP3 capability, but I didn’t use it. It was just a flashy, well-equipped phone that really worked. Built like a tank. I dropped it into puddles and it worked perfectly fine afterwards. I dropped it down the stairs and it was fine. Sometimes I’d forget it in my dorm room and I would have my roommate drop it from our second floor window. If I didn’t catch it, it bounced into the bushes and was still okay.
I have an LG Chocolate that I hate now. Motorola and Samsung, save me!
Huh, I guess I was a late adopter of the RAZR (had mine for less than two years), it’s been around for longer than I realized.
@ARP:
Completely agree, through the years Motorola’s MO is to run their flagship phone line completely into the ground, only to be consistently beaten up by competitors who offer a wider breadth of phones with better features. Witness:
TeleTAC flip phones in the mid-90s (there were still digital models in production until at least ’99)
StarTAC through the late 1990s (wasn’t completely killed off until around 2001-02)
V60, which became feature-stale and obsolete quickly
RAZR, cheapened and beaten to death, and now a crappy phone
I switched from Verizon to TMobile and since they didn’t have the Pearl where I went I got the Moto Rizr. After having 2 of them, both reset themselves whenever they pleased [blank screen, phone didn't know who the carrier was for a minute or so] and then all T9 texting never worked again I gave up on Moto.
I liked the phone but to have 2 phones do the same thing? Well, and their T9 texting sucks.
I got a Nokia and am pretty happy with it. I’ll be getting a Pearl or iPhone next though, Moto pretty much soured me on them.
My first and only Motorola phone was a RAZR. After it broke, I swore I would never get another Motorola again.
That’s perhaps the best decision I’ve heard of Motorola making.
My first Motorola was a ROKR. The sound went after a matter of weeks (ironic, considering the main selling point was the fact it had iTunes). I put up with it for a few months and then accidentally dropped it in a pan of gherkins at work (apparently, pickling a phone doesn’t necessarily preserve the lifespan of it…) and switched to a RAZR.
The first powered off of its own accord and sound worked sporadically at best. Motorola replaced it, but I had exactly the same problems.
When I got my contract in September 2006, I chose a PEBL which was just as bad: within six months, the battery life was down to 20 minutes to a single charge – and Motorola refused to do anything about it, blaming Vodafone – because of course, the failing battery had to be the fault of the carrier…
I gave up on it six months ago and bought myself a Nokia 6070. It is, admittedly, bogstandard, and it doesn’t sync with my Mac, but it works. I love it, and I’m getting an N95 when my contract expires at the end of March.
I am really disappointed by this. I love Motorola products. I was more disappointed, however, when I got my RAZR and found how badly Verizon had hobbled and abused it before I got it, which eliminated most of the RAZR’s selling points, including ease in connecting to the computer. That sort of thing just makes Verizon customers think that Motorola products are over-rated and awful. They really need to control how carriers adapt their hardware.
Except for this RAZR, the Motorola phones I have had have been relatively sturdy and really user-friendly, with a great user-interface.
I really like when a company understand how its customers use their products and adapts those products to better suit those customers. Motorola is one such company, and to see its products go away because of interference from companies like Verizon saddens me.
@theirishscion: Yep! My little free Nokia phone that I got when I signed up with T-Mobile in 2002 was THEEE best phone I’ve had. I switched to Verizon and now I have the LG V9800 (hand-me-down from hubby, who has the V10000, THE VOYAGER OOOOH), but before that I had an LG Chocolate, which…
well, I don’t wanna talk about it. In any case, I’ve never owned a Motorola because of the stale factor and the lack of workingness. And yes, that’s the scientific term.
@TheGoodReverend: In sales terms? Yes it is. If people didn’t want your BS the first time, they’re not gonna want it in Hot Pink the second time, either.
I’ve been flip-flopping between Motorola and Samsung for years now just based on what model I like best when it’s time for an upgrade. Currently on a Blackjack but I loved my 2004 first gen Razr. Don’t stop believing Motorola..you just need to up your cell game.
This could be due in part to bad timing. The RAZR came out and became popular just about 2 years before the iPhone came out. The contracts people signed when they got the RAZR’s all ran out at the same time, giving them all leave to bolt for an iPhone contract.
@LVP: Although I love my phone I have an extreme dislike for Verizon’s operating system. Not sure on mine but on other phones it disables some of the great features of that particular phone. Features that sell the phone.