Lenovo executive sees Motorola making a big jump in the global smartphone market،
Motorola has developed its share of iconic phones. The original Razr V3, launched in 2004, was one of the best-selling feature phones of all time, with over 130 million units sold. The phone that launched Androidmania, the Motorola Droid, was released in November 2009 and was the first real challenger to the iPhone (who could forget the “Droid” notification sound and free turn-by-turn instructions).
But after Motorola failed to take the smartphone market to the next level with the Atrix (which included the first fingerprint scanner on a smartphone in the post-iPhone era), the company saw its phone market share decline from 17% to 4% globally. . These statistics show that Motorola is far behind
Samsung and Apple, both with global shares above or close to 20%. According to
NBC 5-TV, Dallas-Fort WorthMotorola's parent company, Lenovo, has designed plans to more than double Motorola's share of the global smartphone market and place it third after Apple and Samsung.
According to IDC, the top three smartphone brands last year were Apple (20.1%), Samsung (19.4%) and Xiaomi (12.5%). For Motorola to take Xiaomi's place, Lenovo says it will focus on the premium end of the smartphone market, which is the segment of the smartphone market dominated by Apple and Samsung. According to Matthew Zielinski, president of global markets at Lenovo, the current Razr+ foldable case is Motorola's “attempt at the high-end market.”
But for Motorola to break out of its current position as the world's eighth-largest smartphone maker, it will need to take on high-end models such as the Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max and
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra. Motorola had already shown in 2009 that it could take on the iPhone, but the market has changed dramatically since then. Zielinski added that most Razr buyers converted to the clamshell from an iPhone.
In some markets, Motorola is already behind Apple and Samsung. For example, in the United States, Motorola took advantage of ZTE's status as a national security threat to replace the company as the third best-selling smartphone manufacturer in the United States. In Latin America, Motorola is number two, behind Samsung but ahead of Apple. Zielinski says that in markets likely to affect its overall global performance, Motorola will seek to achieve a 10% share through “steady” growth.
One country that Motorola will need to focus on to replace Xiaomi is India, where the country's money-for-value credo has made the brand very popular. Zielinski considers India “by far one of the most strategic countries” for Lenovo. He added: “We are going to place as many bets as possible because we think India's population growth is fantastic and they are great people.”
The executive estimates that Motorola needs only three years to move from eighth to third place in the global smartphone market. “I would bet my salary that in three years we will be number three in the world,” he said.
