How Motorola made the Moto G so cheap - TechRadar UK ~ Electronic Gadgets

Motorola piqued the interest of many a mobile buyer when it announced the rock bottom price for its latest smartphone, the Moto G, which sports a relatively attractive feature set.

TechRadar spoke to Magnus Ahlqvist, Motorola's Vice President for EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) about the new handset and how the firm went about keeping costs low without seriously denting the spec list.

"We're keeping it very simple," Ahlqvist explained, "we believe a lot in speed. When you look at the clean, clear Android experience that's obviously one major factor for keeping costs down."

Motorola has done very little in terms of tinkering with Android, with changes made behind the scenes to improve speed, while keeping the same Google interface. There are no Samsung TouchWiz or HTC Sense style overlays in play here.

You want a big screen

"We've tried to be very disciplined in terms of the feature set and really looked for what consumers really value the most," Ahlqvist told us.

"They value a big and bright screen, but we have looked at all the different things. Where we've been able to save some money we've reinvested it into the Moto G, to make it even more attractive for the consumer."

The same question is always raised when a manufacturer offers such a cut-price device, such as the Google Nexus 5 or Amazon Kindle Fire HDX, are you making a loss on the hardware?

Apparently not with the Moto G, and Ahlqvist was clear on the fact "we're making money on the phone, but obviously we also have a very clear ambition to make it accessible for as many people as possible around the world."

So every Moto G sold will bring in cash for Motorola, but only marginal amounts - that's hardly a surprise though.

Not another Nexus

Ahlqvist: "It just happens that we're owned by Google"

Even though the Moto G is a cut price Android handset and the company is owned by Google, Motorola hasn't just churned out a low-end Nexus - it believes it's still very much a standalone handset manufacturer.

"We operate as a mobile phone company and it just happens that we're owned by Google," Ahlqvist explained.

"The Nexus is more of a reference design for the latest version of Android and in terms of the OS we have no specific advantage what-so-ever. Motorola's mission is to make exceptional devices which are available to as many people as possible."

Small and nimble

Motorola has under gone tremendous change over the past 18 months, with the size of the company significantly cut, but that has apparently helped with development of the Moto G.

"Motorola is smaller, more nimble and faster today and by sticking to very clear consumer concerns which we're trying to address it enables us to be very quick to market."

There are some clear concessions on the Moto G however. The 5MP rear-facing camera isn't exactly going to set the world on fire, while the lack of a microSD slot and the choice of just 8GB or 16GB of internal storage shows how some of the costs were cut.

Motorola has struck a deal with Daddy Google to offer 50GB of additional cloud storage for Moto G users and even if it's not making a huge amount off each handset sale, it could just put the firm back on the map.

Read our hands on: Moto G review

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