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No Mo WinMo for Moto?

Posted by Chris Leckness on January 12, 2009 – 11:13 am  Share
closeThis post was published 10 months 10 days ago.
It\'s is possible that the information within this article is now out of date or updated.

motologo Ok, sorry for the cheesy headline, but it does fit. Just a couple days after I played with a promising Windows Mobile phone from Motorola, the rumor that buzzed a couple weeks ago hit another creditable source, Phone Scoop. In addition to discussing massive layoffs, Phone Scoop got this from Moto…

Phone Scoop has also learned that Motorola is not planning to have a booth at the CTIA Wireless trade show in April, which is the biggest wireless event in the U.S. Lastly, Motorola is prepared to trim the number of new phones it brings to market down to just a dozen per year, and the only smartphones it will produce will be based on Google’s Android platform.

I have learned to love and appreciate other Mobile Operating Systems too, but I still prefer Windows Mobile right now. This might change over time, especially if Microsoft continues to lose ground to the new guys. Apple, Google, and now Palm have showed innovation and fancy graphics along with some decent power, now it’s time for Microsoft to step up. Is Motorola leaving Windows Mobile because of this or to save money with the open source Android?

If this is true, sorry to see ya go Moto.

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Chris Leckness is the Owner/Administrator of Mobilitysite. He is a Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices and a member of the exclusive focus group, Mobius. Chris runs a Mobilitysite, GotZune, and a few other smaller sites and blogs. His personal blog is chris.leckness.com.


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  • Zealot
    Yes, they hired 350 devs for Android, but that doesn't mean they are going to do ONLY Android.

    The Phone Scoop story says that the decision to do only Android was announced by Moto LAST YEAR. I heard no such thing, and couldn;t find it reported anywhere save in this story. I am thinking they may be mistaking the announcment of devoting heavy resources to Android with a statement they are dropping WinMo. Motorola made clear they were dropping Symbian and some other OS development, but keeping Android and WinMo in October.
  • I am pretty sure this is confirmed news by now. Moto has already let go a bunch of their developers and posted adds for, and hired Android developers.
  • Until I hear something more than a rumor, I'm discounting the WinMo part (the layoffs I believe). The co-CEO recently said Motorola was opening an office near Microsoft to collaborate on Windows Mobile, so this would be a huge change of direction in a very short time. Not impossible, of course, but I'm skeptical for now.

    Or maybe Motorola is leaking this hoping that Microsoft will hand them some cash by investing to keep them in the WinMo camp. If Microsoft can buy Danger, why not invest in Motorola? ;)

    Steve
  • HereAndNow
    I think it is a GREAT move for Motorola! Android is a much more modern mobile OS. WinMo still retains too much of the old desktop OS heritage.

    Android's current appeal is likely to be more for consumers, but with the Android Market soon to support paid applications, you can bet there will be a bunch of 3rd party enterprise applications.
  • Micah
    Man, that is a great headline.
  • It's hard to know what this is going to mean for MS. Is this going to be the first of others to abandon WinMo? Obviously WinMo still does more but it has not captured much attention lately.

    It's a pretty scary move for Moto and not sure it will pay off long term, but they made the tough decision to do something now before their marketshare erodes further.
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