The Motorola company has announced the launch of the Ara project, which is aimed at developing modular smartphones, consisting of replaceable elements. Having such a device, the user can replace the display, the processor or the photomodule, whenever he/she wants.
Motorola describes the project as a free, open hardware platform for creating modular phones. They want to make an innovation in the hardware platform, just as Android previously did with the software: create a vibrant ecosystem for the third-party developers, lower barriers for entry, increase the pace of innovation and compress the development time considerably.
Ara will work as follows: it will create an endoskeleton and modules. Endo will be the structural basis on which the modules will be placed. Anything can be used as modules: from the latest processor to the new display, keyboard, battery, a heart rate monitor or literally anything you can think about.
In fact, Motorola has been developing Ara for more than a year, but only recently Dave Hakkens, creator of Phonebloks, met with Motorola authorities. During the conversation, it became clear that Dave’s views and the views of the company are very similar. Motorola has conducted a huge technical work, and Dave has created a huge community of people who dream of a modular phone. In total, it is a great power for the start of an open cooperation.
