It’s like something out of a Greek tragedy: The thing that caused your greatest success will also be the reason for your downfall.

A recent post at Mobhappy got me thinking about the old RAZR again. In the post Carlo relates Motorola’s current problems, which are usually deemed to be down to the nightmare of following such a successful device, to the fact that they clearly ignored usability when creating the RAZR.

The Motorola V3 is undoubtedly one of the biggest selling phones in the history of the mobile industry. Motorola really milked that success by releasing a slew of variants with only small hardware updates, such as 3G and memory card slots, and others which were only colour variants. But while cashing in on this they didn’t take time to make sure they were protecting the legacy that they were in the process of creating. None of the variants really took on the key problems users had reported, the UI and the processor speed. So by cashing in on the status of the V3 and not addressing it’s problems Motorola knowingly made sure millions more people would be getting a terrible user experience.

And this, as Carlo explains, is the reason for their downfall. Motorola haven’t had a successful product since the RAZR. Their last attempt at revitalising the RAZR line failed miserably, which isn’t a surprise as they only changed the Hardware but kept the same basic UI as they had previously. The failing of their device business coupled with internal problems has seen Motorola’s share prices plummet. And when you consider that in a recent survey 80% RAZR owners said that they wouldn’t buy another Motorola phone, it’s hard to see how they’re going to get out of this rut.

However, in true Greek Tragedy style Motorola has also had it’s Catharsis. After going through the failure of their last range of RAZR-updates (K1, Z3 etx.) they have finally recognised their previous mistakes. I’ve recently been testing their new RAZR2 V8 phone which finally brings their much talked about Montavista Linux UI to the mass-market. The UI is a great improvement to the old UI that was on the old RAZRs and is genuinely easy to use. On top of that the phone is quite zippy with no lag when clicking through menus and, more noticeably, when the various animations pop up. The external touch-screen is also a great touch with tactile feedback all of which come together to form a phone that could genuinely have a shot at becoming a success.

But as anyone who has read a Greek Tragedy will know, the Catharsis always comes too late. The current climate clearly indicates that Motorola has missed the chance to redeem itself. This UI should have been released on a device 2 years ago when people were eagerly waiting for it (and when it was rumoured to make it’s appearance) so that they could finally have a RAZR that they could use. Two years ago this Motorola RAZR2 V8 would have been revolutionary and might just have saved Motorola. But in 2007 it’s just another feature phone in a saturated market. Thin is the industry standard so the design, while quite pleasing, isn’t exactly any different to what’s already out there. The opportunity for salvation has passed.