Motorola, which has been cleared to be acquired by Google, updated its Android 4.0, or Ice Cream Sandwich, upgrade schedule. Some ICS bumps are coming in Q3, but most are coming later.
Motorola
Mobility (NYSE:MMI), which just received the approval to be acquired by Google
(NASDAQ:GOOG) by U.S. and European regulators, has updated its timetable for
bringing Android 4.0, or Ice Cream Sandwich, to its legion of Android
smartphones and tablets.
Unfortunately
for ICS fans, it won't be particularly soon. While the ICS bump
began rolling out for the company's Xoom WiFi slate
last month in the United States, the upgrade won't be arriving on many of the
OEM's most popular Android gadgets until the third quarter this year.
That includes
the Motorola Atrix 4G and Atrix 2 handsets for AT&T (NYSE:T), the Photon 4G
smartphone on Sprint (NYSE:S), and the Droid Xyboard 10.1 and 8.2 tablets on
Verizon Wireless, all in the U.S. The ICS timeline gets murkier for many of
Motorola's newer smartphones.
Motorola has
affixed the "further details to follow" description about an ICS
upgrade to the
just-launched Droid 4 and Droid Razr Maxx, the
Droid Razr, Droid Bionic and the Xoom WiFi+3G devices. The Droid 3 and Droid X2
are also on this short list.
That schedule
won't satisfy many users attracted to some of the OEM's best high-end handsets,
but such is the price consumers pay at a time when Android upgrades continue to
be a messy affair.
Motorola
provided the update on its
support forum
Web page, where back in December it
detailed the upgrade process for bringing its
devices to a fresh version of Android.
Users may
check the forum for news about when upgrades are available, though they will
also receive alerts from their handsets or tablets when an upgrade is available
over the air.
Meanwhile, a
lot is going on with Motorola of late.
The OEM, which
last month
inked a deal to build smartphones and tablets
with Intel Atom processors, is
set to unveil an Intel handset at Mobile World
Congress later this month.
On Feb. 13,
both the
European Commission and
Justice Department blessed the company's $12.5
billion merger with Google, which will use the company's 17,000-plus patents to
firm up its defense of Android from Microsoft, Apple and other players in the
increasingly litigious mobile market.
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