Motorola is halting its Droid Bionic on Verizon Wireless' network until the summer, citing the need for "expanded features, functionality and an improved form factor."
Motorola
Mobility April 19 confirmed it is delaying the launch of its Droid Bionic 4G
smartphone until this summer so it can improve the device's hardware and
software.
Introduced
at the Consumer Electronics Show, in January, the
Droid Bionic was to be Motorola's fastest
Android 2.2 smartphone to date, powered by a 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core
processor and fueled by Verizon Wireless's 4G LTE network.
Motorola
Mobility CEO Sanjay Jha said the phone would launch in the second quarter, but
that sentiment was premature, as Motorola told
eWEEK it was delaying the device to make some changes that will
push it to at least late June.
"Based
on compelling feedback since the show, we are incorporating several
enhancements to make this an even better consumer experience," Motorola
said in a statement. "This includes expanded features, functionality and
an improved form factor."
The
Droid Bionic
eWEEK saw at CES
sported a 4.3-inch quarter-high-definition
(qHD) screen and an 8MP camera, as well as HDMI connectivity to let users hook
up their video and games to large-screen HD televisions in full 1080p.
While
its wonderful to claim there is always room for improvement, it's hard to
imagine what improvements Motorola will make on a device that was clearly
speedy in limited testing and sported a crisp, clear screen and an iPhone-like
feel in the hand.
Possibly,
HTC's Thunderbolt, Verizon's first 4G phone that
launched March 17 to accolades, gave Motorola some pause, or perhaps the Droid
Bionic was too similar to the existing Motorola Atrix 4G on AT&T, which
also runs Android 2.2 and offers a qHD screen.
Perhaps
Motorola plans to include a near-field communications chip and will run the
Android 2.3 "Gingerbread" operating system instead of Android 2.2,
which will be more than a year old once the Droid Bionic lands.
It
could be that Motorola's skittishness is predicated on the rumored iPhone 5,
which is expected to be built to accommodate Apple's new cloud computing
software and applications.
Depending
on what rumor one chooses to believe, the
iPhone 5 is coming out in
June, at Apple's
Worldwide Developers Conference, or in the fall in time for the holiday season.
Others believe Apple should wait until 2012 to
release the iPhone 5.
Whatever
its reason for augmenting the device, Motorola is confident it will be a winner
in the 4G-device game. "We believe the Droid Bionic will have those same award-winning
features [as previous Droid phones] and will be one of the best 4G LTE devices
on the market," Motorola concluded.
Email
Print
