According to Czech site Mobile.cz, this poorly-photographed cellphone is in fact the Motorola Z12 ZiNe. Pictured next to predecessors the Z8 and Z10 (you can see the full picture after the cut), the handset appears to have a larger display and touchscreen controls, and looks to be running the same Symbian UIQ OS.
Sadly not much else is revealed, so there’s no way of telling whether the rumors of a Kodak-sourced 5-megapixel camera is included, nor WiFi, GPS or some sort of mobile TV capacity.
[via Unwired View]
Vincent’s thoughts: The other two handsets have “Engineering samples not for resale” on them. How come the Z12 does not?
Motorola can announce all the products they want, but if time to market is slow, then the the product will crash before it even takes off. ie, Anyone remember the MPX300? Is sweet phone by Motorola that never saw the light of day — and yes it was a sweet form-factor and phone for those days. Why it never made it to market is beyond me. Instead they launched that piece of sh1t MPx220 smartphone.
Time-to-Market and price issues have been taken care by Motorola, when it assigned the project to Sasken Communications for providing the software….it can be seen how quickly upgrades have been launched, ie the RIZR series, why Z8 did not turn-out to be a super-hit is anyone’s guess….surely given Sasken’s proven & in-depth expertise in NGN / smartphones which has satisfied most stringent requirements of the likes of Japanese since 2003…can comfortably do similar or better (…given a free hand..) for Motorola ! cheers…
Sasken Communications is the highest rated Telecomm S/W company wholly dedicated to wireless and mobile phone market. The company has tremendous expertise in mobile phones in Linux, Windows Mobile and Symbian OS. Being an R&D company it has capability to deliver end-end software solutions quickly and economically, models can be scaled onto different variants/ models quickly. Check out following news releases:
….June 2007:
Sasken Technologies might be able to lay a significant claim in helping the struggling handset manufacturer turn the corner.
Motorola in its bid to provide a better experience to its consumers will now use a multimedia software developed by Sasken in its new Symbian UIQ platform-based cell phones.. Sasken also has a similar tie-up with NTT DoCoMo phones developed by Panasonic and NEC, launched in April this year, but that is limited to Japan.
With Sasken’s IP embedded in it, Motorola is said to be betting big on the RIZR, and is said to be hoping that this will be the successor to the highly successful RAZR series. Kannankote Srikanth, president and COO, told analysts, “What we announced in Motorola is for RIZR, which is its first model of the Symbian UIQ platform and there will hopefully be more models to follow.”
Motorola entered into the deal with Sasken after its attempt to develop the software in-house did not quite prove satisfactory. “Motorola, earlier used to develop its softwares in-house along with little help from third-party developers. It also acquired US-based TTPCom, one of Sasken’s competitors but it seems now it has decided that Sasken’s technology best fits its needs,” an analyst closely tracking the company told ET.
It seems delays are due Motorola’s internal working, not due to software/working.