Lenovo may be looking to developing markets to grow its smartphone sales, but that doesn’t mean it’s forgotten about the United States. That’s where it’s acquisition of Motorola really pays off, because even if it’s dropped the Motorola branding in favor of the Moto by Lenovo moniker, Moto smartphones are still really popular. After the success of the most-recent Moto X, everyone assumed that more Moto devices would be in the works, and Lenovo confirmed as much earlier this week when it announced that the next Moto smartphone will be released in July, and that it’ll be “more innovative, more attractive” than its predecessor.
So, here we have a fun little quote that we can run a couple of ways with. Lenovo chief Yuanqing Yang said in an interview to the Wall Street Journal that he still thinks that there is room for growth for smartphones in emerging markets, but that he also intends to leverage his Motorola ownership to penetrate the smartphone market in the US. He said that his company will release a phone this July to the US that will be “more innovative, more attractive.” Oooh, a phone that is more innovative and more attractive. On one hand, because of the context surrounding it, that quote almost seems to be in reference to his previous comments about emerging-market growth. Obviously, the US is not an emerging market, but we have certainly seen a push for the types of phones typically introduced in emerging markets, being released in the US. Take the Moto G for example, or ASUS and BLU phones. Is Yang saying that they have a “more innovative, more attractive” lower-end phone for the US that will arrive in July? Probably not. He’s probably referencing the Moto line, which is their only flagship phone line going forward. So if he is talking about the Moto line and a phone that is coming out in July, what could be “more innovative, more attractive” than what is already on the market? Or that they have done previously? Well, they could use a fingerprint reader for one. Maybe they have more Moto app features lined up? An even better camera than what they put in this past year’s Moto X?
