Skip to main content

Motorola Q Phone Receives Mixed Reaction

MarketWatch reports that since coming on the market in June, Motorola Inc.'s much-hyped Q smartphone has sold at a steady pace. Now the question is whether the company can meet their aggressive sales target.

Investors will get a clearer idea of how well the Q is selling when Motorola reports second-quarter results. The company expects to ship 1.5 million units in the first 180 days, though Motorola has shown signs it could deliver 2 million units, according to some analysts.

Like other smartphones, the Q is visually appealing, with its sleek keyboard, color screen and Internet capabilities. It also plays video and music. Critics, however, it's not as 'easy to use' as competing devices offered by Research In Motion Ltd. and Palm Inc., and is less suitable for serious business users.

So, what exactly is the target market for this new device? According to James Faucette, an analyst with PacificCrest, the retailers he has polled say "wide appeal has been limited" for the Q, though the device has sold "reasonably well" for a new smartphone on the market.

Yet, wide appeal is exactly what Motorola seeks. The company wants to push the device particularly to consumers, few of whom currently own smartphones. Most users for now are executives, businesspeople and professional workers. Analyst Albert Lin of American Technology Research says Motorola can meet its initial six-month goal, but he expects sales to taper off in the long run unless the company makes big improvements to the Q.

Popular posts from this blog

How WLAN Transforms Industrial Automation

The industrial sector is on the eve of a wireless transformation, driven by an urgent demand for greater network capacity, reliability, and deterministic performance. Historically, manufacturers and mission-critical operations have relied on wired networks — favoring their predictability — because spectrum congestion in legacy 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands limited confidence in wireless for operational technology (OT) environments. However, with the introduction and rapid adoption of the 6GHz spectrum, compounded by significant advances in Wi-Fi standards, industrial facilities are now poised to embrace wireless LANs as the backbone for automation and digital innovation. Industrial WLAN Market Development Recent research from ABI Research forecasts that over 70 percent of industrial-grade wireless LAN access points (WLAN APs) shipped in 2030 will support the 6GHz band. This is a leap from 2 percent in 2023, highlighting a rapid and profound technological shift. The market for ruggedized indust...