Motorola chat shows Lapdock staying put

Motorola's mobile device VP Christy Wyatt in an interview Friday committed her company to the Lapdock concept. In speaking with AllThingsD, she saw notebook docks like the Lapdock 100 still being important to consolidation. People don't want to be "carrying 52 cords and 52 chargers and multiple data plans," she said, so it made sense to give them a way to extend the main device they have.

Wyatt hinted there might be different ways than just the Lapdock as well. "I do think you are going to see us continue to go down that path," she said. "That can take many forms."

The Lapdocks give higher-end Motorola Android phones as close to a notebook's behavior as possible. They not only add an LCD, keyboard, and peripherals but kick the phone into a special Webtop mode that gets a desktop-like interface, Firefox for browsing, and other features that wouldn't fit at phone size.

Outside of this, Wyatt said the company would keep focusing on making Android useful at work. Although Apple's iPad dominates enterprise tablet use, Motorola "would like to focus on" getting its Android tablets into the business world in 2012.

Cloud media services like the MotoCast app on the Droid RAZR, which streams content from a home computer to the phone, would play their own part. Smart Actions from the same phone would also be important. Like Apple's Automator, they create what nearly amounts to scripted tasks, such as launching an exercise app when headphones are plugged in, and make them easy to understand and use.

Motorola has had a mixed track record in 2011. Its smartphone platform grew in 2011, but its tablets largely failed as too-high prices and a lack of truly stand-out features let Apple walk away while Motorola had to ship fewer and fewer tablets.

By Electronista Staff