Motorola (Moto 360)

Motorola (Moto 360) Introduction to company Motorola is one telecommunications company that has always been a leader in the development and launching of trendsetting innovative products. Its rich history is characterized by numerous achievements as the pioneer of several technologies. While several corporations subscribe to the notion that churning out ideas is the instrumental factor in coming up with revolutionary products, Motorola has always focused on the big picture - the essence of their business (Strategic Direction, 2010).

For close to eight decades, the company has spearheaded several innovations in the field of telecommunications and as a result achieved great successes like their feat of being the company that made the equipment through which the first words from the moon were transmitted. It was also the leader of the cell phone revolution having developed DynaTac, the first cell phone that was handheld. Motorola is also credited for being the first in delivering the first all-HDTV technical standard as well as the WiMAX mobile handoff (Motorola Annual Report, 2007).

Motorola provides several services and develops many solutions and technologies including wireless accessories, cell phones, digital entertainment devices, data and voice services as well as wireless access systems (Motorola Annual Report, 2007). The main Motorola mobile products are cell phones, Bluetooth devices, two-way radios, portable energy systems and IDEN technology. Motorola also develops products for governments and institutions. Such products include biometrics, computer aided dispatch systems, records management systems and integrated information management. Home networking solutions and Motorola Networks are also some of the major product offerings of the company (123Helme, 2014).

The Company's History The company was started in 1928 by Paul Galvin. It was then called Galvin Manufacturing Corporation. Motorola has since grown into a large global company with several competitive product offerings targeting consumers and large organizations. With sales of $42.6 billion in the year 2006 and an employee roster of not less than 60,000, the company's size is indisputable (Hyder, Burrows & Mackinnon, 2008). The first production line at the company was focused on battery eliminators. These devices allowed people to plug their radios directly into wall sockets.

This effort had succeeded the company's attempt to produce storage- batteries. With the growth of the market for battery eliminators, they saw an opportunity to capture the young market and the company, under the "Motorola" brand, started production for car radios. The years that followed saw Motorola also start producing home radios and police radios. Motorola's Walkie-Talkie was a key communication gadget during World War 2.

Motorola acquired Detrola, a competitor in the car radio business, and made themselves the main suppliers for Ford, American Motors and Chrysler who were then the three biggest car makers in Detroit (Hyder, Burrows & Mackinnon, 2008). After the war, Motorola shifted its strategy and began to focus more on the production of advanced technology. The company sold most of its consumer production lines and began making semiconductors and transistors.

The 1978 purchase of Universal Data Systems and the 1982 purchase of Four - Phase Systems was geared towards giving the company capacity to perform distributed data processing. Distributed data processing involves the analysis of data by the use of national computer networks. The purchases also came in handy in its cellular phone network which began operations in 1983.

Taking advantage of the existing trade policies in the 1980s, Motorola made use of its economies of scale, advancement in technology and experience to position itself as a pager and cell phone giant (Hyder, Burrows & Mackinnon, 2008). Organization of Company Motorola is a technology company and produces products for Communications Equipment Industry. There are three business lines i.e. Mobile Devices, Enterprise Mobility Solutions and Home and Network Mobility.

Its Mobile Devices department produces and sells handsets and accessories while Home and Network Mobility produces, sells and also services digital entertainment devices, digital video, broadband access infrastructure systems and related voice and data customer premise equipment to other telecommunications companies.

Enterprise Mobility Solutions designs and produces, sells and installs and also services digital two-way and analog radio, data and voice communications systems and products for wireless broad band systems, private networks and end - to- end enterprise mobility systems for various institutions such as governments and safety agencies as well as commercial enterprises in various sectors such as transportation, retail, manufacturing, utility and health care (Motorola Annual Report, 2007). Motorola were the original developers of Six Sigma and one of the main competencies of Motorola is operations.

Unlike other technology companies, Motorola runs its own assembly and production lines and produces 70% of its products in-house. Only 30% is outsourced. Most technology companies outsource most of their manufacturing. Motorola has direct suppliers totaling to 5800 and records an annual expenditure of $11.3 billion paid to these suppliers (Georgieva, Owen & Shiverick, 2010). Motorola radically transformed its supply chain when it introduced Android phones as the new efforts targeted a market they had not previously pursued.

Further, there were challenges in continuing to distribute RAZRphone while at the same time introducing other suppliers as well as SKU's into the new model. To implement their plan, the company successfully adopted build-to-order processes which allowed them to effectively move products in the supply chain more quickly and respond to customer demands and needs accurately. The inventory of the mobile segment effectively reduced by half between 2008 and 2009 (Georgieva, Owen & Shiverick, 2010).

Strategy of Motorola Company The company aims at being the leading provider of handsets and mobile products to consumers worldwide. To achieve this goal, the company will simplify product platforms, improving their mid-tier and high end products, and also cementing their foothold on the main markets. They took considerable steps in the year 2008 to make wireless phones easier to use. While at it, they have also reduced the size of the devices and the associated costs (Motorola Annual Report, 2008).

Simplification of product offerings is a key part of any company's business strategy. The number of product platforms that Motorola support has seen significant decrease in the recent past. The company now emphasizes more on smartphone and 3G devices and also focuses on CDMA and iDEN. The company is currently working hard to implement plans to streamline both software and hardware platforms so as to simplify their product platforms as well as the structure of the systems.

The hardware platforms will make use of fewer suppliers of chipsets for the handsets and Android will be paid more attention to in the software platforms. Apart from Android other considerations are Windows Mobile and P2K which is a creation of Motorola. Windows Mobile is created by Microsoft while Android is platform that has been developed by Google. The company also seeks to pay more attention to CDMA software platforms and iDEN technology (Motorola Annual Report, 2008).

These strategic moves will afford Motorola the opportunity to advance its Mobile business as it lays emphasis on innovation and development and also adapting and responding to the rapidly changing and competitive marketplace. It is expected that the need for data focused devices is expected to grow exponentially with the market now evolving to march the new needs being born due to converged wireless devices, internet on mobile devices, and use of social networks, messaging and navigation.

The new devices offer customers unique experiences and require different solutions such as the development of useful applications and provision of unique services. Motorola aims at utilizing the new wave of smartphones to provide its customers with feature packed phones capable of performing computer functions like browsing the internet and sending email. For a considerable period, the company's focus will be the development of architectures around the Android OS.

With the entry of new Windows Mobile generations into the market, Motorola has plans to increase the focus it has on Windows Mobile too (Motorola Annual Report, 2008). Motorola Today The company's strategy is to provide products that will make the life of the modern mobile person much easier, improve their communications options and engage them. It has invested in such technologies like R&D to ensure that it maintains its leadership in spheres like imaging and scanning engines.

The company is not resting on its laurels either when it comes to shaping the future of technology. Effort has been made to ensure that its product lines stay ahead of peers so that they are capable of producing new innovative products for the next generation. Motorola aims at offering the best services and products so as to achieve its goals of retaining and capturing new markets and consumers.

Providing a wide range of new products helps in customer retention as the company affords its customer base a wide variety of products to choose from ( Motorola Solutions, 2013). Strengths of the company Motorola controls a huge portion of the market for its core business and this has tremendously helped the brand. It is one of the leaders in the provision of semiconductors as well as advanced electronic systems owning approximately 45% of these products' global market.

The firm is ever coming up with new ways of doing things and is ever launching new innovative and trendsetting products. This has ensured that it stays ahead of the park and keeps competitors from encroaching on its customer base. Motorola is considered a technology inventor and has an advantage that it was a pioneer in the field. Such experience has come in handy in gauging customer needs and wants. It can be remembered that it is Motorola that was the first to commercialize police and home radio communications.

In fact, the name "Motorola" denotes "sound in motion." The company launched a research center in the 1940s in Phoenix, Arizona for the exploration of solid-state electronics. The beginning of the 1980s saw Motorola controlling the just emerging market for mobile and wireless devices for communication like cell phones and pagers. Motorola continued its success into the 1990s landing an order as the primary contractor for IRIDIUM & reg; satellite-based global communication system. Today, Motorola has thriving operations the world over with facilities for manufacturing available on most continents.

It has at least 139-000 employees around the world and has shown strong commitment towards the delivery of world class customer service.

The company is committed to ensuring that its loyal customer base has the best in products and services by continuously improving their standards and striving to be the gold standard in product development and service provision in the world of technology (UK Essays, n.d.) Weaknesses of Company Motorola had previously been reluctant in changing its business strategy and had become comfortable due its position as a leader in the American market and this allowed upcoming Japanese companies to penetrate into the American market.

This would not have been the case had the company adopted a more aggressive marketing strategy that would have eliminated new competition (UK Essays, n.d.). There is also evidence of inefficiency in its organizational structure. The growth of the company has brought with it several complexities that have made it difficult to manage branches and subsidiaries around the world. Further, the company has to deal with stiff competition from budding firms like Sony Ericson, Nokia and Verizon Wireless.

Samsung is also a major challenger and is slowly encroaching into its market share. These competitors pose a serious threat since their products are almost functionally similar (Motorola Inc. Strengths and Weaknesses, 2013). The similarities pose a huge threat. All these companies make 3G phones just like Motorola and they have been able to eat into Motorola's market share thereby hugely affecting the company's performance. Motorola has not been unable to come up with a strategy to help it retain its customer base.

For instance, the company's inability to better its product line has made it difficult to compete in the new market. Bad strategies and inability to satisfy some needs of customers have made sales figures to significantly fall in the few years that have passed. Motorola should therefore develop new ways of doing things and come up with new forward thinking strategies to help it sustain its business and achieve its goals and objectives (Motorola Inc. Strengths and Weaknesses, 2013).

Motorola's Innovative Change to Android Manufacturing Once a giant mobile phone producer, Motorola managed to sell over 100 million units of its pride - Motorola Razr. Although it still commands a considerable share of the market, a glimpse of the share trading indicate that its shares are on the decline, at 13.7% from the previous year's market share of 20%. But when it opted to manufacture phones on the Android platform, its position in the market improved as can be attested to by the available reviews.

This means it has a means of inching up the ladder of the smartphone manufacturing. Its net loss for this year at $86 million was slightly worse than what it lost for the same period the previous year. It experienced a decrease in the volume of handsets shipped from 9.3 million units to 8.9 million units; however, a ray of hope was shed by the spectacular rise in the volume of its smartphone shipment which zoomed upwards from 4.1 million in the past year to 5.1 million in the current year (Varma, 2012).

With the announcement by Google (GOOG) that they had agreed to acquire Motorola Mobility, a company from Libertyville, Illinois for $12.5 million which is equivalent to a premium of 63% at $40 per share by the close of Motorola's share price trading on August 12, 2011 a unanimous verdict approved by the boards of directors of both companies was reached. Although Google said it will operate Motorola as an independent outfit, this new acquisition by Motorola Mobility is seen by many to provide a cushion to make Android viable.

This move prompted the announcement by Motorola on November 17, 2011 that its shareholders had approved its merger with Google Inc. For $12.5 billion a move that also got a nod from the United States Department of Justice together with the EU on the 13TH of February 2012. The deal was finally concluded on May 22, 2012 when it subsequently got approval by the Chinese government (Varma, 2012). Google has made a drastic change on the operations of Motorola Mobility by treating it as an independent operation including almost 20,000 of its employees.

Hived off from its mother company, earlier in the year, it is still made up of two independent entities namely Home which manufactures set-top boxes and other IPTV equipment and Mobile Devices that mainly produces mobile phones (Ricknas, 2011).

What are android smart watches? The present internet mobile niche is an appropriate platform on which developing and speculative innovations that can completely alter the contemporary accessories people use such as inventions, that is change people's movements and images into digital images and speculative formulations by using smart watches as input/output devices, (I/O) capable of functioning between individual public/private domains and the cloud.

Smart watches can be described as minute devices with tiny touch displays capable of storing digital identities or personal data with direct access to the digital sphere. With cloud computing acting as warehouses for personal information relating to personal phonebooks, musical playlists etc., it is important that such devices have less ample processing capability and memory.

Factors that will make smartphones different include: a) the interface with public as well as private digital infrastructures (i.e., interoperability with other I/O devices, for instance displays and applications), b) connection speed as well as security, c) user identification security, d) connection reliability. This is an innovation many believe will miniaturize smartphones into smart watches (Seppala & Broeans, 2013).

The smart watch is a new kind of device that will make accomplishments of simple tasks such as carrying out simple searches, note entry, making calls, reading messages, setting an alarm, managing calendars and much more quite convenient (TekCarta, 2013). In my view, this new-fangled devices will have two important technological aspects to its functionalities.

Wrist Mounted Electronic Device Current generation of smart watches majorly function seamlessly with cordless tablets or smartphones because they are tuned to control some functionalities of smartphones in order to process certain types of information such as email notifications when messages newly arrive. It is apparent that in years to come smart watches will be much more like mobile phones complete with SIM cards, software and other electronic elements needed for them to work well.

Smartphones still enjoy their present sizes mainly due to the number of things they are supposed to do on their display screens such as playing high-quality video, and being large enough to offer a satisfactory gaming, video as well as web-browsing experience. But their size is largely as a result of the touch-based user interface and what makes them even bigger is the need for a large, high-resolution color display as well as the requirement to play feature films in HD.

These factors necessitate need for even bigger and bigger batteries (TekCarta, 2013). The sizes of the devices can be reduced and made much more compact if the need for larger display units necessary for web browsing, playing games and watching movies are completely eliminated. This will also reduce the need for power guzzling graphic processing chips important for video games. A lot of space will subsequently be saved and the sizes of the batteries also reduced.

These devices could be even made much smaller if the touch-based interface is taken away and instead voice-based interface be applied (TekCarta, 2013). The implication of this is that now it is technologically possible to produce tiny devices that can be operated as mobile phones. All the requisite manufacturing elements are already in place and all that is needed is assembly. There is no gainsaying that this will not be a simple task just in the same way that producing smartphones wasn't easy.

However, if a technology company with the kind of skilled workforce necessary for such a venture is given the responsibility of producing such a device then it is hoped it will be available in the market sooner rather than later (TekCarta, 2013). The kind of communication concept envisaged could almost be similar to what was seen in Sci-Fi movies years ago where a tiny device was combined with a small loudspeaker plugged into the ear.

In the long run, a wrist mounted smart watch will be cheaper than a smartphone because their production will entail use of fewer materials (TekCarta, 2013). Voice-based User Interface People who had no knowledge of programming eventually found it easier and convenient to use computers due to the invention of the mouse and graphical user interfaces. The way mobile devices are used could greatly be impacted upon by interfaces based on voice activation which essentially would need invention of a new generation of devices such as a smart watch.

The main reason why such inventive steps will be made is because users are increasingly finding it necessary to perform myriad tasks on the go. So it would be easier for them to send group messages, organize meetings, order for pizzas, play music or video games, make calls or read their emails all at one go. It is therefore obvious that if the advantages and convenience offered by integrating wrist-mounted devices and other user interfaces are compelling enough then such devices will flood the market (TekCarta, 2013).

Not to be left behind, Motorola too has announced its very own smart watch powered by Android referred to as Moto 360. Unlike other smart watches already in the market which are square-faced, the new device by Motorola has a round face (Patino, 2014). The Corporate Vice President of EMEA and APAC, Magnus Ahlqvist, and the product's Senior Vice President of Motorola, Charlie Tritcher, emphasize that the main target of developing the Moto 360 was to infuse craft and style into the device market.

With wrist bands made of choice leather or aircraft-grade stainless steel, the watch boasts of excellent design materials (GadgetzArena, 2014). It makes use of Android Wear OS which is an operating system made by Google and specially meant for electronics that can be worn. This explains why it functions and resembles Google Now instead of your typical smartphone or tablet.

And since it can wirelessly be linked to your phone, it is capable of allowing response to various apps, play-pause your music as you want and also enable you to send text messages. Most interesting is its ability to initiate tracking functions that can enable you to know how many steps you have made apart from enabling you to answer phone calls and send text messages. With additional supporting apps you can even monitor the rate of calories burnt and so on (Review Moto360, 2014).

Design Features of Moto 360 Moto 360 has the following remarkable Specs. Corning GLW +0.57% Gorilla Glass 512 MB RAM and 4GB internal storage 1.5-inches display with resolution of 320 x 290 Motorola has claimed full day battery backup 46 mm diameter and 11mm height 49g weight TI OMAP 3 processor Built-in heart-rate monitors (GadgetzArena, 2014).

Motorola has claimed full day battery backup Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity with smartphone with Android OS 4.3 or higher IP67 water resistance (capable to be worn in shower; however, not for swimming) Although Moto 360 is a design project spearheaded mainly by Motorola Corporation, it is undoubtedly compatible with Android OS and so it can be described as an Android smart phone.

It is in great demand due to its sleek features and design contras, for instance, it has wide ranging applications from Bluetooth 4.0 technology that enables wireless but efficient synching with other devices without connectivity issues. Its vibration alerts can secretly let you know of important events while its A1.5? backlit LCD touch screen with 320 x 290 resolutions and 205 ppi makes its navigation and visual features easy to use. Apart from that, its Corning Gorilla Glass 3 construction guarantees durability, and its inbuilt adjustable brightness facilitates customization.

For physical exercise freaks, this technological marvel allows for monitoring fitness progress thought out the day by deploying its built-in pedometer that calculates the number of steps one takes. It also has an inbuilt optical heart-rate monitor (PPG). The time and date can be read through a digital watch interface with clear and vivid readouts, and with an inner calendar and alarm system, one cannot be off schedule. For those who love water sports the watch is water-proofed and can last for up to 30 minutes in 3" of water.

This means that while you are involved in some form of aquatic activity or you are swimming, you don't need to worry. Its protective plastic case and stainless steel cover makes it durable while.