Motorola Demos iTunes Enabled Phone

By Ed Oswald | Published February 14, 2005, 6:32 PM

Motorola's long-awaited iTunes compatible phone made its debut at 3GSM Monday in Cannes, along with several other high-tech phones based on the company's popular RAZR phone concept.

Motorola said that all of its second generation phones will bear the four letter identification scheme from now on. The BLZR will be the black colored version of the RAZR phone and will be available by the end of the month. The SLVR will follow the design cues of the RAZR, but without a flip, and the PEBL will be a round-shaped phone. Both are slated for a third quarter release.

For faster third generation networks, Motorola unveiled two new phones. The E1120 will include a 3-megapixel camera in a non-flip design.

The phone that has created the most buzz since inklings of such a concept were discussed by Steve Jobs at Macworld 2005, is the E1060 - Motorola's first phone to support Apple's iTunes Music Store. Late last year, the company joined the growing digital music market by announcing iTunes would be the default music player on the company's handsets.

Although iTunes will be the default, Motorola says it will continue to support other players.

"We're committed to have iTunes as the default music client, but we'll also continue to support other music players such as RealPlayer," Amer Husaini, vice president for Motorola's mobile devices group in Europe, Middle East, Africa and South Asia said.

Officials at Motorola think the new services are the key to reversing the company's significant loss of market share over the past decade to rival Nokia. "We finally discovered the right direction," Husani said.

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