Motorola Unveils Its First Android Smartphone

| Sep 14, 2009 | Mobile Devices | Competitive Intelligence Report

| Analyst: Avi Greengart

Current Perspective: Slightly Positive
Vendor Importance: Very High
Market Impact: Moderate

Event Summary

September 10, 2009 – Motorola announced the CLIQ with MOTOBLUR coming to T-Mobile USA later this fall (no pricing was announced). The CLIQ is Motorola’s first Android-powered device, and features 3G, a touchscreen and a sliding QWERTY keyboard. MOTOBLUR manages and integrates communications – from work e-mail to social networking activity – on the CLIQ and streams updates to contacts, posts, messages, photos from sources including Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Gmail, and work and personal e-mail.

Analytical Summary

• Current Perspective: Slightly positive on Motorola’s MOTOBLUR and CLIQ announcements, as the emphasis on cloud-based social network integration appears to be competitive with remarkably similar efforts by HTC and Palm. The additional functionality includes extensive use of widgets, streaming Facebook updates and full Microsoft Exchange support. While hardly alone in the notion of a socially connected phone with a universal messaging client, it should be enough to keep Motorola ahead of products from Samsung, Nokia, LG and HTC, which offer a less comprehensive mobile experience. Motorola’s brand is much stronger than HTC’s – especially at T-Mobile, where HTC isn’t even allowed to use its brand in most of its product names – though pricing has not been announced for the CLIQ. Motorola has said it will launch an additional Android phone at another carrier in the coming weeks.

• Vendor Importance: Very high to Motorola, which is basically pinning its future as an independent handset vendor on the Android/MOTOBLUR initiative. To recover from its post-RAZR hangover, Motorola cancelled the majority of its products in favor of focusing on Google’s Android. Of course, HTC, Samsung, LG and others are also licensing Android, so there was a real danger that if Motorola simply produced attractive hardware with a stock load of Android, it would be no better off than before.

• Market Impact: Moderate on smartphones market, not because the technology is unique, but because Motorola needed to deliver a new line of phones that provide a rich user experience to survive as an independent handset vendor. The capabilities that MOTOBLUR brings to the table nicely pull information from various sources – corporate mail servers, Web-based messaging/calendar solutions and social networking sites. This type of mobile experience is rapidly becoming table stakes in touchscreen smartphones not named “iPhone,” and the differences between Motorola’s efforts here and those of Palm, HTC and Nokia are of implementation and degree. Motorola is not out of the woods yet, but if it can leverage MOTOBLUR across multiple devices at multiple carriers, it could be a serious player in the growing smartphone market.

CLIENTS ONLY

Current Perspective

Competitive Positives and Concerns

Recommended Vendor Actions

| Client access - Full report in Mobile Devices | More information

Recommended Competitor Actions

• Palm’s key differentiator against the CLIQ is visually rich multitasking (Android multi-tasks just fine, but it isn’t as easy or as fluid to move among open applications). On the social network integration front, Synergy is competitive, and Palm can claim that webOS provides a cleaner working environment compared to MOTOBLUR’s cluttered pages of widgets.

• HTC needs to get Sense to T-Mobile’s phones and its brand more prominently associated with them. The G1 needs a refresh to more modern hardware design.

• RIM’s unique email experience and strong brand have insulated it from the increasingly tough competition in touchscreen smartphones. That won’t last forever. RIM has reinvented its BlackBerry line once before with the introduction of the Pearl, but the Storm was just an application of the Pearl’s UI to a touchscreen. In addition to hybrid touchscreen/QWERTY devices, RIM needs to develop an all new user interface that is fully competitive with the iPhone, Palm webOS and the various iterations of Google Android.

• Apple is safe for now with its unparalleled brand strength, simple but polished user interface, and industry-leading App Store. However, for the next major iteration of the iPhone OS, Apple must allow third party multitasking and should find a way to integrate social network data and mapping into the user experience to keep up with HTC/Palm/Motorola and stay ahead of Nokia.

• Samsung, LG and Nokia are the big losers here, and LG will be directly affected once Motorola brings similar products to other carriers (T-Mobile does not offer LG products). Nokia’s main smartphone OS (Symbian) does not offer a competitive user experience yet. Samsung’s TouchWiz widget overlay just clutters up limited screen real estate without providing MOTOBLUR-style integrated data benefits. It’s hard to know how far behind LG is, as the company hasn’t brought a single S-Class phone to the U.S.

• Nokia N900 is almost certainly coming to T-Mobile (see Nokia World 2009: Maemo 5 Makes Mobile Linux Consumer-Friendly (for Rich Consumers, Anyway), August 31, 2009), but the EUR 500 device may end up priced well above the CLIQ. If so, Nokia needs less expensive maemo 5 handsets to fill out the line. Nokia has publicized the N900’s visual multitasking, but has been oddly quiet on its integrated social networking capabilities; rectifying that ought to be a priority as well.

Recommended End User / Customer Actions

• The CLIQ is important for Motorola, but hardly the only good smartphone choice in the market for consumers. Apple’s iPhone line has a simpler user interface, vastly more applications, iTunes integration and an entire ecosystem of accessories. RIM’s BlackBerry line still offers the most focused mobile email experience.

• Palm’s Synergy for its Pre and Pixi offer much of the same social network integration as MOTOBLUR on top of webOS, which has a richer visual multitasking. Even Nokia has a touchscreen smartphone with social network integration and rich multitasking – the N900 running maemo 5 mobile Linux – which is expected at T-Mobile USA before the end of the year as well.

• T-Mobile subscribers considering an Android phone really ought to put off purchasing a T-Mobile G1 or myTouch 3G at least until pricing is released for the CLIQ. Unlike the CLIQ, T-Mobile’s self-branded Android phones have limited functionality beyond the stock Android build, and T-Mobile has said it will not upgrade those phones – manufactured by HTC – with HTC’s Sense software overlay.

• Consumers looking for an Android phone but who do not have a carrier brand preference have two front runners with integrated social network data – Motorola’s CLIQ coming to T-Mobile and HTC’s Hero arriving at Sprint. For some, the decision will depend on keyboard choice (the Hero is all-touchscreen, while the CLIQ has a physical sliding keyboard), but for others, carrier data plan pricing will carry the day (Sprint offers more for less).

• We still expect additional Android phones to be announced before the holiday season, so even those eyeing the CLIQ or the Hero may want to hold off until all the choices are revealed.

CLIENTS ONLY

Current Perspective

Competitive Positives and Concerns

Recommended Vendor Actions

| Client access - Full report in Mobile Devices | More information

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