Actually, quite sad for those who like me started using cellular phones with the famous Motorola "brick," and years later with the infallible StarTac (other than its antennas that everyone kept breaking). Motorola played an indispensable role in helping make what has become the mobile phone industry today. Too bad most here have no clue what it was like in the beginning, but then again most Americans could care less about history.
I couldn't agree more. Until Nokia came along and kicked their butts in the late 90's (?), Motorola was the manufacturer of mobiles.
Motorola has been coasting on their industrial design while their software has been allowed to languish and become a joke of the industry. No one wants to spend a few hundred on a phone, or even get a "free" phone and deal with an unintuitive, cumbersome UI that is guaranteed to be slow as hell.
Which is not to say their industrial design is that great. The RAZR is notorious for falling apart for no reason at all, and putting a ringer-change button on the outside of every phone is monumentally stupid.
I do, however, see a buyout from Apple being possible!
Imagine how beneficial will be for Apple if all those experienced Motorola engineers start working on the iPhone.
Imagine a smart CEO for Motorola partnering with Apple akin to Intel and providing advanced chipset guts for the future iPhones and expanding from there.
Motorola has a ton of engineering talent. It just needs a visionary who can see how partnering with the Apples, the Boeings, the Lockheeds, NASA and more to provide advanced parts to allow for advances, in general.
oh i'm one of those with a long history with motorola. i've had those first bricks and 4 startacs. then i started to realize motorola wasn't the same anymore...
well, today i would never buy a motorola again. it's a shi**y product with a terrible os...
The RAZR is a nice-looking (and sized) phone with an interface that is like being hit in the face with a brick.
Windows Mobile is like being hit in the face with a brick that occasionally explodes. I had to hard-reset periodically to get the damn thing to make a phone call--losing all of my data and contacts in the process. EPIC FAIL.
As far as I am concerned, the only player in the market at present other than Apple is Nokia.
If HTC were to put Android on their hardware (instead of WM), Apple might have a problem on its hands.
Amen. They (Moto) focused so hard on branding (nice ads, nice photography, but unsubstantial products) and "ever thinner" RAZR "2 V9! Latest OMFG!" .... and as you say, rubbish OS, sad but true, RAZR is the SUXXZR. That said, no way Moto is just going to dump out its mobile phones overnight. Still a core business. "...and instead focus on its enterprise and government sectors"... I nearly spat out my morning tea when reading that.
Yes, selling off the mobile business and concentrating on enterprise and government sectors is something Moto may well do. However, this would be entirely insane and IMO, it could happen, if it does, Goodbye Moto. You were important for a while, now I just look at your pretty ads and laugh at the creatives that milked your Marketing Dept. for all, *all* that it is worth.
I dont know what OS they have been using, but it strikes me that it's at the heart of their problem.
Yup. The best way to describe their old OS is... sloooooooow. It's pretty embarrassing once you have a lot of contacts on a Moto phone using said OS... the thing chugs, painfully, when you try to do anything contacts-related in the menus. It makes OS X 10.0 look like a speedster.
The have developed a new Java/Linux OS (JUIX) that's a lot better, but, in typical Moto fashion, they have been incredibly slow to roll it out across their entire lineup.
I guess they call it 'execution' because if you don't, you're really executing yourself?
Actually, quite sad for those who like me started using cellular phones with the famous Motorola "brick," and years later with the infallible StarTac (other than its antennas that everyone kept breaking). Motorola played an indispensable role in helping make what has become the mobile phone industry today. Too bad most here have no clue what it was like in the beginning, but then again most Americans could care less about history.
Yeah, it's too bad that they're doing poorly. They need to clean house and buy Palm or something. Palm's a real innovator.
For Apple, a Motorola departure would only serve to vindicate its decision to create its own handset. The failure of the ROKR E1 music phone in both its awkward hardware and feature-limited iTunes software were reportedly frustrating enough to Apple head Steve Jobs that he launched an end-run around Motorola, discussing an Apple-made phone with Cingular (now AT&T) even before the ROKR reached store shelves.
I don't believe that Apple made the iPhone because the ROKR was so limited. I believe the ROKR was so limited because Apple was making the iPhone. Apple was the one that made sure no more than 100 songs could be put on the phone at one time.
Late 90's Motorola decides power PC CPUs for desktop (ie Apple) ain't worth it anymore 'cause "Apple is teh dying", declaring the AIM alliance a failure, and focus resources on power pc for communications stuff, tossing apple to the curb, and switching their semiconductor group to all windows/dell, dumping Macs that had been there for years. Later the semiconductor group is amputated by demand of wall streeters, shareholders for bleeding billions quarter after quarter. Year 2001 60,000 people were laid off at motorola. Freescale formerly the semiconductor group is sold to a private group and taken off the stock market. Motorola drops from #1 cellphone maker to #2 to Nokia. More recently they continued, dropping to #3. In part because they were getting their chips from Freescale, who still couldn't get the product out. So ironic that now Apple is playing in Motorola's field and taking their customers.
They may be 'experienced,' but they will need to be re-educated. Lots of unlearning needed there.
Maybe not if MOTO's problem was bad management. The only reason the RAZR line existed at all was that its original team was in some sort of special isolation from standard MOTO red tape. It doesn't sound like the company learned anything from that project.
Motorola has been coasting on their industrial design while their software has been allowed to languish and become a joke of the industry.
And that sums it all up nicely.
Every 'Oil patch' employee from Texas to Alberta had a Motorola phone. It was a phone that "could be dropped from the Empire State Building, and survive" as another poster stated. It was a phone for trades people... rugged, durable. An industry phone when only industry could afford cell.
Then they sucked some choda for 10 years and coasted on contracts with providers, all the while being surpassed by Nokia and Samsung.
They didn't do anything significant again until the RAZOR (Macbook Air tactic). "Hey look... it's thin... it sucks ass and nobody wants it... but it's thin".
What happened is that consumers got educated and sophisticated in Motorola's 10 year coasting period. The RAZOR was the last 'OMG... industrial design matters over function" phone to be released.
What I find interesting is that Apple realized this flaw in the industry, and created the iPhone... but have severely and detrimentally made the same mistake as Motorola with the Macbook Air.
Innovation and industrial design together are a sure thing. On their own... not so much.
Late 90's Motorola decides power PC CPUs for desktop (ie Apple) ain't worth it anymore 'cause "Apple is teh dying", declaring the AIM alliance a failure, and focus resources on power pc for communications stuff, tossing apple to the curb, and switching their semiconductor group to all windows/dell, dumping Macs that had been there for years. Later the semiconductor group is amputated by demand of wall streeters, shareholders for bleeding billions quarter after quarter. Year 2001 60,000 people were laid off at motorola. Freescale formerly the semiconductor group is sold to a private group and taken off the stock market. Motorola drops from #1 cellphone maker to #2 to Nokia. More recently they continued, dropping to #3. In part because they were getting their chips from Freescale, who still couldn't get the product out. So ironic that now Apple is playing in Motorola's field and taking their customers.
I remember all that, Motorola is such a huge global company, it so big that one part of the company were developing a new product while another part was doing pretty much the same thing, neither group knew about each others existence. This wasn't strategic, it was the fact the company is such an old grey stumbling elephant...
I worked there as a contractor, sadly to say migrating Mac's over to HP desktops. I must of saw every variation of mac made at the time, this was before OSX. I suppose thats where I got interested in Mac hardware.
Though, I hope Apple don't take over their business or engineers. Mind you Motorola were very good at dual and tri band mobiles. So maybe they should take one or two radio engineers. But I reckon they're well into finishing the next gen iPhone with 3G
What I find interesting is that Apple realized this flaw in the industry, and created the iPhone... but have severely and detrimentally made the same mistake as Motorola with the Macbook Air.
Innovation and industrial design together are a sure thing. On their own... not so much.
true, that Air thing I don't get either, half baked idea. Should of being 11" or 12" with FW... Stick with making computers not handbag accessories.
Hi, this is my first post - I was moved to sign up because this thread just reminded me of how much I loved my startac.
I like to think I am not subject to bouts of nostalgia... guess not... where's the 512K enhanced thread?
also, my razr is the only cell phone, except for the startac, that gets reception that is far better than anyone else in the room...
oh my...
that takes me back.... to when i was sitting at the beach at 3 am, my Newton hooked up to my StarTac (with a $120 cable) and checking my email by accessing the internet through CompuServe at the end of the road in Canada...
sigh...
say what you will, but that was a great setup. slow, but it worked. that was the last cell phone i had, now where's the iPhone?
Comments
Actually, quite sad for those who like me started using cellular phones with the famous Motorola "brick," and years later with the infallible StarTac (other than its antennas that everyone kept breaking). Motorola played an indispensable role in helping make what has become the mobile phone industry today. Too bad most here have no clue what it was like in the beginning, but then again most Americans could care less about history.
I couldn't agree more. Until Nokia came along and kicked their butts in the late 90's (?), Motorola was the manufacturer of mobiles.
Which is not to say their industrial design is that great. The RAZR is notorious for falling apart for no reason at all, and putting a ringer-change button on the outside of every phone is monumentally stupid.
No way! Is this guy for real?
And I say, soon man is going to land in the moon!
I do, however, see a buyout from Apple being possible!
Imagine how beneficial will be for Apple if all those experienced Motorola engineers start working on the iPhone.
Imagine a smart CEO for Motorola partnering with Apple akin to Intel and providing advanced chipset guts for the future iPhones and expanding from there.
Motorola has a ton of engineering talent. It just needs a visionary who can see how partnering with the Apples, the Boeings, the Lockheeds, NASA and more to provide advanced parts to allow for advances, in general.
well, today i would never buy a motorola again. it's a shi**y product with a terrible os...
Windows Mobile is like being hit in the face with a brick that occasionally explodes. I had to hard-reset periodically to get the damn thing to make a phone call--losing all of my data and contacts in the process. EPIC FAIL.
As far as I am concerned, the only player in the market at present other than Apple is Nokia.
If HTC were to put Android on their hardware (instead of WM), Apple might have a problem on its hands.
Motorola has a ton of engineering talent.
Well said, thanks for supporting me on this
Yes, selling off the mobile business and concentrating on enterprise and government sectors is something Moto may well do. However, this would be entirely insane and IMO, it could happen, if it does, Goodbye Moto. You were important for a while, now I just look at your pretty ads and laugh at the creatives that milked your Marketing Dept. for all, *all* that it is worth.
I dont know what OS they have been using, but it strikes me that it's at the heart of their problem.
Yup. The best way to describe their old OS is... sloooooooow. It's pretty embarrassing once you have a lot of contacts on a Moto phone using said OS... the thing chugs, painfully, when you try to do anything contacts-related in the menus. It makes OS X 10.0 look like a speedster.
The have developed a new Java/Linux OS (JUIX) that's a lot better, but, in typical Moto fashion, they have been incredibly slow to roll it out across their entire lineup.
I guess they call it 'execution' because if you don't, you're really executing yourself?
.
I've never seen a RAZR in use. Maybe that's just me, though.
I bet I would see around 50 different people with a RAZR a day last year.
Granted I am a teacher and a ton of my students had them, but I did see them outside of school too....a lot of them.
I like to think I am not subject to bouts of nostalgia... guess not... where's the 512K enhanced thread?
also, my razr is the only cell phone, except for the startac, that gets reception that is far better than anyone else in the room...
Actually, quite sad for those who like me started using cellular phones with the famous Motorola "brick," and years later with the infallible StarTac (other than its antennas that everyone kept breaking). Motorola played an indispensable role in helping make what has become the mobile phone industry today. Too bad most here have no clue what it was like in the beginning, but then again most Americans could care less about history.
Yeah, it's too bad that they're doing poorly. They need to clean house and buy Palm or something. Palm's a real innovator.
For Apple, a Motorola departure would only serve to vindicate its decision to create its own handset. The failure of the ROKR E1 music phone in both its awkward hardware and feature-limited iTunes software were reportedly frustrating enough to Apple head Steve Jobs that he launched an end-run around Motorola, discussing an Apple-made phone with Cingular (now AT&T) even before the ROKR reached store shelves.
I don't believe that Apple made the iPhone because the ROKR was so limited. I believe the ROKR was so limited because Apple was making the iPhone. Apple was the one that made sure no more than 100 songs could be put on the phone at one time.
They may be 'experienced,' but they will need to be re-educated. Lots of unlearning needed there.
Maybe not if MOTO's problem was bad management. The only reason the RAZR line existed at all was that its original team was in some sort of special isolation from standard MOTO red tape. It doesn't sound like the company learned anything from that project.
Motorola has been coasting on their industrial design while their software has been allowed to languish and become a joke of the industry.
And that sums it all up nicely.
Every 'Oil patch' employee from Texas to Alberta had a Motorola phone. It was a phone that "could be dropped from the Empire State Building, and survive" as another poster stated. It was a phone for trades people... rugged, durable. An industry phone when only industry could afford cell.
Then they sucked some choda for 10 years and coasted on contracts with providers, all the while being surpassed by Nokia and Samsung.
They didn't do anything significant again until the RAZOR (Macbook Air tactic). "Hey look... it's thin... it sucks ass and nobody wants it... but it's thin".
What happened is that consumers got educated and sophisticated in Motorola's 10 year coasting period. The RAZOR was the last 'OMG... industrial design matters over function" phone to be released.
What I find interesting is that Apple realized this flaw in the industry, and created the iPhone... but have severely and detrimentally made the same mistake as Motorola with the Macbook Air.
Innovation and industrial design together are a sure thing. On their own... not so much.
Late 90's Motorola decides power PC CPUs for desktop (ie Apple) ain't worth it anymore 'cause "Apple is teh dying", declaring the AIM alliance a failure, and focus resources on power pc for communications stuff, tossing apple to the curb, and switching their semiconductor group to all windows/dell, dumping Macs that had been there for years. Later the semiconductor group is amputated by demand of wall streeters, shareholders for bleeding billions quarter after quarter. Year 2001 60,000 people were laid off at motorola. Freescale formerly the semiconductor group is sold to a private group and taken off the stock market. Motorola drops from #1 cellphone maker to #2 to Nokia. More recently they continued, dropping to #3. In part because they were getting their chips from Freescale, who still couldn't get the product out. So ironic that now Apple is playing in Motorola's field and taking their customers.
I remember all that, Motorola is such a huge global company, it so big that one part of the company were developing a new product while another part was doing pretty much the same thing, neither group knew about each others existence. This wasn't strategic, it was the fact the company is such an old grey stumbling elephant...
I worked there as a contractor, sadly to say migrating Mac's over to HP desktops. I must of saw every variation of mac made at the time, this was before OSX. I suppose thats where I got interested in Mac hardware.
Though, I hope Apple don't take over their business or engineers. Mind you Motorola were very good at dual and tri band mobiles. So maybe they should take one or two radio engineers. But I reckon they're well into finishing the next gen iPhone with 3G
What I find interesting is that Apple realized this flaw in the industry, and created the iPhone... but have severely and detrimentally made the same mistake as Motorola with the Macbook Air.
Innovation and industrial design together are a sure thing. On their own... not so much.
true, that Air thing I don't get either, half baked idea. Should of being 11" or 12" with FW... Stick with making computers not handbag accessories.
Hi, this is my first post - I was moved to sign up because this thread just reminded me of how much I loved my startac.
I like to think I am not subject to bouts of nostalgia... guess not... where's the 512K enhanced thread?
also, my razr is the only cell phone, except for the startac, that gets reception that is far better than anyone else in the room...
oh my...
that takes me back.... to when i was sitting at the beach at 3 am, my Newton hooked up to my StarTac (with a $120 cable) and checking my email by accessing the internet through CompuServe at the end of the road in Canada...
sigh...
say what you will, but that was a great setup. slow, but it worked. that was the last cell phone i had, now where's the iPhone?