We’ve said before that Motorola has some changes in store for its flagship smartphone. Famous leakster Evan Blass, a.k.a @evleaks has said that Motorola intends to change its flagship moniker from “Moto X” to “Moto Z.” Well, we now have confirmation that @evleaks is right.
A new trademark patent filed by Motorola Trademark Holdings, LLC has the “Moto Z” moniker in big black letters — at which point, the Moto Z moniker can no longer be denied. If you never ever believed @evleaks was legitimate, this leak (among many others in the last few years, may I point out) solidifies his position as a trustworthy leakster. The patent itself refers to “phones” and “smartphones,” so we could be looking at 1) smartphones, 2) flip phones, or 3) a hybrid line that brings some smart features to a flip phone line. We could be looking at all 3 here, with Lenovo trying to unify its product lines (now that the company has purchased and owns Motorola). The “Z” in the new trademark moniker makes perfect sense, considering that Lenovo has publicized its “ZenFone” line heavily (the “Z” in “ZenFone” is a huge giveaway).
The Moto Z patent was filed on May 17, 2016, so this is indeed current news and a testimony that the name change rumor is set to become a reality for the company’s smartphone line. It’s still interesting to see that Motorola is abandoning the “X” for the “Z,” while Sony is abandoning the “Z” for the “X.”
We don’t know what Motorola has in store, except to say that a modular smartphone is in the works. Motorola already has modules for it, such as a battery pack and swappable covers, but Motorola doesn’t intend to maintain the removable battery that LG has placed into its modular LG G5. Evan Blass has said that Motorola will likely have more success with its Moto Z (if it is a modular smartphone) than the LG G5 because LG had to sacrifice much of the functionality of what its smartphone could be just for the sake of maintaining a removable battery.
We don’t know why Motorola is changing the name of its flagship and abandoning the “X,” but we’ll hear all about it soon enough. June 9th is the rumored data for the Moto Z launch.
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