Fixing Motorola's mess: kick that smartphone strategy into high gear

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Nothing really new with Moto...: I gotta wonder if Motorola's afraid of success. Or something.

Back in November 2005, they released the Motorola A1200 Ming - a very cool touch screen phone in ASIA only. However, the cool factor of that phone soon got away from them. By November 2006, it was the #2 most searched item on pricegrabber.com - right behind the black Moto RAZR. Mind you, this was with ZERO advertising on the part of Moto or anyone else. None of the US carriers picked up the A1200 (which is an EPIC FAIL on their part, but that's another rant). As you can see, there was a LOT of underground buzz about the phone. It had STILL not been officially sold in the US - except on the gray market.

By the time they got off their collective duffs and decided to sell it in the US (late Dec 2006), the iPhone announcment was around the corner and it was pretty much game over.

Mind you, the Ming does maybe 90% of what the original iPhone did and then some. About the only features missing from the A1200 would be multitouch and the vast storage space. It has a 2 GB microSD chip slot, but that still lacks when compared to the 4, 8 or 16 GB available to the iPhone.

Now, jump forward and Moto finally did land a variant of the A1200 in Verizon's stable - the Krave.

The point is, Moto seriously lacks the stones to aggressively market their stuff on their own. Maybe that's part of their deals with the various carriers - they stay low key and don't compete directly with them. Maybe they just don't want to support a bunch of unlocked phones. Hard to say. Maybe both.

It's not that they can't do cool phones. The RAZR and the A1200 are proof they can bring on the cool factor. It's their marketing that sucks hard boiled rotten eggs.

For whatever reason, NONE of the US carriers picked up the Ming. I'll be the first to admit - it isn't perfect. It could be better. It could have used more RAM and more storage. But for the time it came out, it was a really nice phone.

It still is. I still get people wanting to check it out in 2009.

Oh.. and Sam... It has an app built in that NO other phone - not even the iPhone has... It's got a business card scanner...; Posted by: Wolfie2K3 Posted on: 05/01/09 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use