by Playfuls Staff |
11th March 2006
Because of a technical issue which causes the phone to drop calls or shut down, Cingular Wireless and T-Mobile USA have announced that they will temporarily interrupt the selling of Morotola's Razr cell phone. [more]
Fist sold towards the end of 2004, the Razr mobile phone was mostly acclaimed for its thin design and is still one of Motorola's key products.
T-Mobile said that the component issue manifested only with a limited number of GSM RAZR handsets purchased by carriers after February 1st. Motorola noted to MobileTracker this afternoon that the problem is related to affected handsets dropping calls and then having the screen go white and reboot.
Motorola spokesman Alan Buddendeck said the faulty phones were sold to operators between January 16th and February 28th, with the first of the U.S. shipments on February the 1st, but did not mention where else the phones were sold.
One analyst, Ed Snyder of Charter Equity Research, said he did not expect a material impact from the problem but expressed concerns about how Motorola manages its suppliers. Another analyst said the halted sales may hurt the phone companies' market shares, according to Reuters.
Motorola's stock was down 46 cents, meaning more than 2 percent, in afternoon trade on the New York Stock Exchange.
At this time, on Cingular's online store the Razr phone is listed but has been marked as out of stock since Monday, while on T-Mobile's store is not shown at all starting from Wednesday. Motorola expects full availability to return to normal by next week.
As the company says, any customers possessing such a handsets should contact their carrier and facilitate an exchange with a working product.
"Motorola and its customers have taken steps to ensure an easy exchange process for consumers."
