February 5th, 2009
How Motorola can win with Android
Raymond Loewy, American Industrial Designer
One word — design.
Motorola has one chance to become relevant in handsets again, and most analysts give it no chance of making a comeback.
Weren’t they saying that about Nintendo before the Wii?
Motorola’s fourth quarter was almost Madoff-esque, at least on the handset side. Our own Larry Dignan suggested the handset division might be closed if it can’t be turned-around and sold soon.
So how can that one word help? Raymond Loewy is dead. True, but there are other American design firms — Smart Design, Whipsaw, NewDealDesign, Astro Design, and Stuart Karten among them. Many of our top architecture schools also teach industrial design.
The talent is there. Activate it.
I would concentrate on Android because it’s flexible. Any added features a designer decides they need can be built quickly. Offer a big check and let the top dogs go after it.
Then do something else. A contest.
Offer a $1 million prize, or a design contract, for the top Android design from anywhere in America. Deadline March 31. Plaster it in every design school. Make some Web ads on it. Wake the PR people up with it.
You’re looking for a Wii. You won’t find it in Schaumburg. You can find it in America. If you’re open to it.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for 30 years, a tech freelancer since 1983. You can follow Dana on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 02/05/09
