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Google's Motorola now shipping 100,000 Moto X phones a week

Google's Motorola now shipping 100,000 Moto X phones a week

By Reuters | Updated: 11 September 2013 10:05 IST

Motorola is shipping 100,000 of its new Moto X phones weekly from a manufacturing facility near Dallas, a modest start for a made-in-the-USA phone that marks the most significant effort to revive the iconic company after Google Inc bought it last year.

Motorola is betting that color-customization, voice-activated software and its homegrown pedigree will help the company narrow the gap with market leaders Apple and Samsung Electronics, even though labor costs are running about three times higher than if the devices were built in China.

Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside said in an interview that the Texas facility, operated by contract manufacturer Flextronics , was capable of producing "tens of millions" of phones a year but expansion depended on demand.

The factory's current output of 100,000 units a week is only the first phase of a larger plan, he said. And the factory's output did not necessarily mean all the phones have sold to consumers.

"When you set up to ramp a factory you need a plan, and we have shipment targets we need to make with our carrier partners, and where we need to be right now is 100,000 units and that's where we are," Woodside said.

He would not say how many of the phones now being shipped were standard models sold by wireless carriers, and how many were custom-designed models that consumers ordered directly from Motorola's website. He said only that custom orders were "substantial" and Motorola was selling the phones at a profit.

The Moto X is coming to market as other handset makers revamp their lineups. On Tuesday, Apple unveiled new iPhones on Tuesday, including a cheaper iPhone 5C available in a variety of new colors and a higher-end 5S that includes a special fingerprint scanner for added security.

Flextronics CEO Mike McNamara said in a separate interview that the labor cost of manufacturing a phone in the United States, where workers are paid about $12 to $14 an hour, is about three times higher than in China, where a typical hourly wage is about $4.

But operating a facility in the U.S. offered other advantages, including the ability to get custom-built phones to consumers in the country in four days, and lower freight and logistics costs.

"You have to offset it with what's the time-to-market savings and what's the fact that you drive your truck down the street to drop it off. You got to add up all these things," he said.

Motorola Moto X

REVIEW
KEY SPECS
NEWS

Design
Display
Software
Performance
Battery Life
Camera
Value for Money

Good
Stock Android experience
Handy software enhancements
Minimalistic design and ergonomics

Bad
Limited storage
Average camera performance
Mediocre battery life

Read detailed Motorola Moto X review

Display 4.70-inch

Processor Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro (MSM8960AB)

Front Camera 2-megapixel

Rear Camera 10-megapixel

RAM 2GB

Storage 16GB

Battery Capacity 2200mAh

OS Android 4.2

Resolution 720x1280 pixels

More Motorola mobiles Motorola mobiles price in India

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