The Attack of The Droid

On Friday, November 6th, Motorola and it's partner Verizon Wireless released the highly anticipated "Droid" smartphone. This launch was not highly anticipated because of the new, innovative technological advancements it made to its competitor the iPhone. In fact, it is behind in this regard because of its lack of "apps," which the iPhone markets as being incredibly valuable.
It was highly anticipated because it offered an escape from AT&T's service.

AT&T's coverage has been under-fire recently because it seems to lack quality coverage. In a USA Today article (that analyzes the lawsuit about Verizon's knock-off "There's A Map For That" campain), AT&T's service is questioned, "The reality is that (AT&T's) network is not performing well in many markets," says Walter Piecyk, a Pali Research analyst. "And the perception among consumers is even worse than reality."

Because customers are loyal to the iPhone interface, but have become overwhelmingly frustrated by AT&T's coverage, the Droid was expected to be a reasonable alternative. Many in the industry felt the same way, namely blogger Matthew Shaer, stated that while "Maybe it wasn't the iPhone-obliterating launch that some Droid-loving pundits predicted...it was a major-league kick-off, no matter how you slice it." He goes on to give reasons why the launch was a pretty impressive success.

I agree, and I raise him "an impressive success with a more impressive future."

However, not everyone agrees with Mr. Shaer and I. Cramer, a critique for the phonereviews' blog, believes that the Droid was a disappointing phone with an even more disappointing debut in the smartphone market. Based on his short critique, I can only extrapolate that he does not see a bright future for the Droid in the market.

I beg to differ. While the Droid now has only 250,000 customers in its opening week compared to the iPhone 3G's 1.6 million, the amount of Droid customers will continue to rise. Based on the quality of coverage that Verizon provides over AT&T, many of the original 1.6 million iPhone users will be making the switch to the Droid.

When it comes down to it, if two phones are shown to offer similar, equal quality services (apps, texting, high-speed internet), customers will side with the phone that has the best coverage--every phone's most important attribute. With Verizon's coverage decimating that of AT&T, Steve Jobs is going to have to strike another chord of brilliance in the marketing world, or the Droid is likely to take over the planet.