Corporate executives say the darndest things, especially this week in San Francisco. Forget about Mobile rld Congress its endless supply of new gadget announcements. The most interesting headlines are being made by strategists bean counters sitting down to chat at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference.
It all started on Tuesday when Hewlett-ckard CEO Meg itman said the world’s largest maker was diverting attention away from s toward tablets. Then, on dnesday, e rner Cable CFO Irene Esteves said that nobody wants gigabit Ethernet. Not to be outdone, CFO chette on Thursday completed the trifecta of “I can’t believe they just said that” comments by implying that Motorola phones are nice, but meh, they’re not that interesting, according to The Verge.
ere’s my ‘wow’ phone?
en announced it was buying Motorola in 2011, it sparked anticipation that those crazy rs might try some innovative product business model ideas with their new company. About nine months three Ice Cream Swich phones later, however, all -controlled Motorola has really done is play catch-up to the Samsung Galaxy line.
But don’t blame for this smartphone yawn fest, chette says, blame it on the previous management that came up with these hsets. “’ve inherited 18 months of [product] pipeline that we actually have to drain right now,” chette said on Thursday, because nothing instills investor confidence better than a plumbing metaphor.
chette made similar comments in nuary during a company earnings call, based on his timeline, we should see a truly -inspired Motorola Razr or Droid around late 2013 or early 2014. Until then, we can expect a Motorola product lineup that is “fine, but not really to the stards that what would say is wow, innovative, transformative,” according to chette.
Galaxy rising
At least nine months of so-so smartphones is a problem for , since a resurgent Motorola would be a boon for the overall health of the Android platform. Even though Android is the most popular operating system on the planet, the current race for smartphone dominance is between just two competitors: Apple Samsung.
Samsung is the number one smartphone vendor in the world, in 2012 the Galaxy-maker owned about 42 percent of the worldwide market share for Android devices, according to a recent report by market research firm IDC. Competing Android makers trailed the Korea-based manufacturer in the single digits, IDC said (IDC are both owned by International Data Group).
Samsung’s prominence as the stard bearer for Android devices hasn’t gone unnoticed by the management at HQ. A recent report in The ll Street urnal said executives are concerned that Samsung might leverage its importance to Android’s future by eating into the search giant’s all-important mobile advertising revenue. execs have since downplayed any concerns about Samsung, but a set of popular Motorola phones would certainly help keep Samsung in check.
But nine months is an eternity in the smartphone world, allows Samsung’s popularity room to grow, especially after it releases the Galaxy S4 later this month. ile we wait for Motorola to amaze us, chette says the company’s product development team is hard at work on the “next wave of innovation” for smartphones their early work is “quite promising.”
