An advert for the Motorola X has leaked and while the teaser was a little light on solid facts, it’s clear that the US company is keen to make two points very clear - the device will be manufactured in the ‘States and it will be customisable by the customer.
How these customisations will work is anybody’s guess at this stage, but given the fact that both Google (Motorola’s parent company) and Motorola are based in the US, we can only assume that the choice to build the device on home turf to enable swift output to domestic customers.
The device, which has been called the Moto X up until now, may well be the first in a line of devices from Motorola as the advert that shows a male and a female jumping into water, with their bodies forming an ‘X’ and a ‘1’. Motorola is said to be open to the idea of making its X the first in a line of devices, but the company appears to be hedging its bets and moving forward cautiously to see how the first big release since its Razr Maxx HD launched.
The ad is well timed if patriotism is the effect that Google and Motorola are going for as it goes live in The New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal today, just one day ahead of Independence Day, the July 4 celebration.
Production of the Moto X (or X1?) is set to bring more than 2000 jobs to the area of Fort Worth, in Texas, where the manufacturing plant has been set up, which was designed by Mark Randall, formerly of Amazon, with the express purpose of smartphone manufacture.
Motorola's vice president of global brand and product marketing, Brian Wallace spoke to advertising publication Adage to explain, ‘Smartphones are very different than other tech products a consumer owns. They're closer to shoes or a watch. You carry it with you everywhere you go. Everyone sees what phone you're carrying and they judge you on it. Yet it's the one thing you carry that's the least customisable.'
Wallace would not say which phone elements could be customised but his comments would suggest an aesthetic focus. He did add that Motorola wants to do for phones what Google did for Search.
All of this is well and good, but we’re more interested in what these so-called ‘designed by you’ features will be. Some suggest custom colours or text on the body of the device, while others muse over whether the device could come pre-loaded with the apps of your choice. But if Motorola is already sending out teasers, there can’t be much longer until the big reveal.
Motorola has talked about wanting to challenge rivals such as Apple’s iPhone and the Samsung Galaxy S4 and to do that it needs a global launch, the fact that the news comes courtesy of Motorola’s VP global brand and product marketing could perhaps be seen as reassuring.
by tcrammond via Featured Articles
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