Motorola is still planning to launch its re-invented Motorola Razr before the end of the year, two recent reports have claimed.
The nostalgic handset will be based on the icon flip-phone design which debuted in late 2005, but rather than sporting a keypad and screen – it will have a single, uninterrupted foldable OLED that unfurls when you flip open the smartphone. This elongated touchscreen will be perfectly suited to running multiple apps on-top of one another.
Sony has already moved its smartphone range to a similarly long and thin screen design. The company says it’s ideal for running splitscreen apps as well as watching movies in the landscape orientation without any black bars above or below the display.
According to a source speaking to CNET, we’re likely to see the new Motorola Razr in December 2019. That means Motorola will be able to achieve its promise of launching a foldable handset no later than everybody else in the market.
That pledge was made by Motorola Vice President of Global Product Dan Dery back in March in an interview with Engadget. During the same chat, Dery revealed the company had been working on its folding flagship “a long time ago” and that the firm had “been doing a lot of iteration”.
It’s not entirely clear why the re-imagined Razr will launch so close to the end of the year. Given the Galaxy Fold and Huawei Mate X were originally set to launch on May 3 and September, respectively, it appears Motorola was either struck with some of the same issues or has decided to play it safe in light of the troubles experienced by Samsung.
Otherwise, if the release date was always planned for late December, the Chicago-based company’s promise of launching no later than rivals seems a little disingenuous.
With the Razr 2019, it seems Motorola wants to capitalise on the same nostalgia-drenched success experienced by HMD Global when it announced the all-new Nokia 3310 in 2018. The handset, which arrived with Snake preinstalled, was a massive critical and commercial success for the company.
Motorola looks set to combine that appeal with a cutting-edge pliable OLED panel. If nothing else, the result cannot possibly be dull.
It’s worth noting Motorola has never explicitly confirmed the existence of its Razr 2019 redesign. While VP Dan Geary has spoken openly about the company’s interest in folding designs and how these could be used in future products, it’s never confirmed what these would be called.
When asked for details on the design, Geary was a little cagey. However, he did rule-out a Huawei Mate X-like design.
He said: “We have been testing a plastic OLED device with plastic film on top. The fact that you’re touching [that kind of display] with your nails is scratching it. It has a short life right away; it starts dying the day you unpack it. But it’s beautiful. That first day, it’s beautiful.”
That definitely sounds to us like Motorola is planning on putting a flexible display on the inside of whatever folding phone is does release.
As always, it’s worth taking all of this with a pinch of salt. Multinational companies like Motorola often design, experiment and patent technologies and designs that never make it out of the R&D department into a finished commercial product.