Lenovo presented five devices in Russia under the new Motorola brand. The Chinese company bought the Motorola Mobility division from Google for $2.91 billion back in 2014.

Budget devices will go on sale first - before the end of June 2017, notes a Lenovo representative. Models in the mid-price segment will be available for purchase in Moscow in July. And in August, Lenovo will begin selling the premium M model, according to company materials. Unlike traditional smartphones, Z-series devices can be tuned using additional Moto Mods modules: for example, a projector can be added to the smartphone to watch videos on a wide screen, equipped with a zoom lens, etc., Lenovo promises. The vendor strives to become one of the world's three leading smartphone manufacturers, including in the Russian market, it said in a statement.

At the beginning of 2017, the head of Lenovo’s mobile division in Eastern Europe, Alexey Klochkov, told Vedomosti that Lenovo plans to sell all its smartphones under the Lenovo moto brand, and to abolish the rest, including Motorola. The issue of choosing a brand was decided until recently - in the end they decided to go with Motorola, says a source close to the company. He found it difficult to name the reasons.

The old Motorola is no longer there, but customers remember this brand very well; in fact, it is a legend in the telephone market, notes Oleg Beriev, president of the Mildberry branding agency. Lenovo is reviving this legend - a common move in the market, he notes. Beriev explains the revival of the Motorola brand, among other things, by attempts to search for identity, which is characteristic of most Chinese companies operating in the international market. This is an attempt to blur Chinese roots and position Lenovo in the smartphone market as an international company, he argues.

In the middle of the last decade, Motorola released some of the most popular phone brands in the world (see inset), recalls leading analyst of Mobile Research Group Eldar Murtazin. Using this brand is a good chance for Lenovo, Murtazin believes. But everything will depend on how Lenovo builds relationships with retail chains and how the marketing and advertising strategy will be built, he notes. If everything goes well, according to Murtazin’s calculations, by the end of 2017 Motorola will be able to occupy up to 5% of the Russian smartphone market in units.

At the end of 2017, the Finnish HMD Global announced the relaunch of the Nokia brand - it owns the rights to use this brand for mobile devices. Sales of a remake of the Nokia 3310 push-button device began in Russia in May 2017, and in June smartphones of the updated brand appeared on the market. The first batch of Nokia 3310 that arrived in Russia contained about 10,000 phones, says a source close to HMD’s partner company.

So far, Lenovo is far from the top three smartphone manufacturers in Russia. From the materials of the company, a partner of several retailers (previously their accuracy was confirmed by several market participants), it follows that Lenovo’s share of the Russian market in physical terms is declining. In May 2016 it was 9.5% (3rd place in smartphone sales in Russia), but a year later it reached only 4.1% (6th place). Euroset . sells a lot of Lenovo and hopes for good prospects for the Motorola brand, Alexey Shirokov, director of the procurement department of Euroset, told Vedomosti

Motorola Moto Z2 Play in Lunar Gray Motorola Moto C in Metallic Cherry Motorola Moto C Plus in Pearl White Motorola Moto E4 in Fine Gold Motorola Moto E4 Plus in Iron Gray

The updated Motorola line may arouse some interest among Russian buyers, but in the coming year one should not expect the brand to become one of the ten most popular smartphone brands in Russia, says Svyaznoy representative Sergei Tikhonov. Now Motorola is one of many B-brands present in Russia, he notes. For successful sales of the updated line, a combination of several factors is necessary: the presence of devices in the largest retail chains, more significant investments in marketing and promotion of gadgets, as well as a wider range of devices, says Tikhonov.

Moto models are complemented by modules that turn a smartphone into a gaming or music device; such an ecosystem approach can attract a new audience, says M.video representative Valeria Andreeva.

Motorola returns to Russia