Razr2 launch sends carriers into choruses of ‘me too’

The piling on began early last Friday as Verizon Wireless, then Sprint Nextel Corp. and AT&T Mobility all announced they would carry Motorola Inc.’s Razr2 handset, with launches beginning at Sprint Nextel this month and continuing with Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility in September.
Later Friday, however, T-Mobile USA Inc., Alltel Corp. and U.S. Cellular Corp. all jumped into the scrum, with me-too announcements of their own.
By day’s end, Motorola turned out a press release that quoted Stu Reed, Motorola’s newly appointed head of mobile devices, delivering a bit of hype.
“The Motorola Razr2 delivers the sharpest mobile experiences available-and customers of every national carrier in the U.S. can now own one,” Reed said. “With smart features available such as blazing-fast 3G wireless broadband, and modern style that’s slimmer and stronger than the original, the Motorola Razr2 is the ultimate iconic feature phone.”
The Razr2 will hit the U.S. in three major models. The v9 is HSDPA, the v9m is CDMA2000 1x EV-DO and the v8 is GSM/GPRS/EDGE. Pricing ranges from $250 to $300.
The beleaguered company may be forgiven for a bit of hyperbole in describing the Razr2, as it is betting heavily that the “sleeker outside, more powerful inside” device will revive its fortunes in the United States market in which it dominates. Motorola’s U.S. market share slid to 33% from 37% between the first and second quarters of this year. A European launch of the Razr2 is also anticipated, which could help restore Motorola’s sliding fortunes overseas as well.
Last week, analyst Tero Kuittinen of Avian Securities L.L.C. said that even modest sales of the devices across so many distribution channels could well provide Motorola with a bounce back from the depths of its second-quarter malaise and revive the handset vendor’s fortunes.
In contrast, analyst Avi Greengart at Current Analysis said that despite the widespread distribution-and partly because of it-Motorola would have to spend heavily on an effective marketing campaign to focus consumers on the next-generation Razr device, as the original Razr continues to sell well at price points as low as free to $50. (More expensive, feature-packed Razrs sell in the $100 to $200 range, with subsidies.)