Moto Mods hackathon in San Francisco produces more practical Mods

Lenovo has been hosting hackathons to help develop more useful Mods for its Moto line. At the recently concluded hackathon in San Francisco there were a lot of great and practical ideas we’d actually want to see as actual products on the market. The winning Mod was a solar-powered battery charger. But aside from that, there was a baby monitor with real-time notifications for things like room temperature, a mod for allowing diabetics to check their blood sugar, and even a breathalyzer Mod from a group of high school kids. Called ModCoholic, it’ll ask you if you want to grab a cab if you’re over the legal limit.

The winning teams at these events get to present their ideas at Motorola’s headquarters in Chicago to industry leaders like Lenovo Capital, who could invest and fund promising ideas. These hackathons are being held around the globe with the next one happening in Shenzhen, China by mid-March.

Source: Engadget

Lenovo plans to release 12 Moto Mods per year

Looks like Lenovo is taking the modular phone movement quite seriously. At least serious enough that they intend to release at least 12 Moto Mods per year. There are currently seven different Mods available since it was released back in July. Lenovo’s Moto Mods Director John Touvannas told CNET they intend to boost development of the Mods in 2017. “Our goal is to get more Mods out this year than we did last year, no question,” he said. There have been two new Moto Mods added recently into the mix: a battery pack from Mophie and a car mount from Incipio. We do hope Lenovo and Motorola do intend to push through with these plans to truly develop the modular phone segment.

Source: SlashGear

Review: Lenovo Moto Z

Text and photos By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

On its own, the Moto Z is an inspired flagship device. It’s made of top tier materials, offers the best of Moto’s bespoke software experiences, yet presents users with a pretty pure Android experience with very little in the way of unwanted bloatware (unless you’re getting it from a carrier).

It’s my impression that Motorola, one of the oldest makers of smartphones in the industry, has always seen a future beyond the smartphone. 

Their first Android device, the Droid (sold in Canada as the Motorola Milestone), was the first to have a slide-out keyboard which differentiated it from most candy bar Androids of the time.

The Moto Atrix smartphone, had the ability to be mated to a laptop accessory and even a desktop, it preceded Microsoft’s Continuum feature of extending a smartphone to become a notebook replacement.

With Moto Maker on the Moto X, the company championed customization and personalization, plus they introduced leather, wood, and other materials to the smartphone market. Kicking off a trend that companies like OnePlus, LG, Huawei and others picked up on, but never really pulled off elegantly. Now, with the Moto Z, we're seeing the next phase of evolution.

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Reserve a Moto Z with Rogers and get a free Insta-Share Projector

Looking forward to grabbing a Moto Z and its Moto Mods? Save a bit of money by reserving your unit with Rogers. The telco is giving the Moto Insta-Share Projector for free—and saving you around $400 in the process—if you reserve the Moto Z on select two-year Share Everything plans. This offer will be available until October 4 or while stocks last. You can reserve the phone through this link.