Motorola to Re-Brand Moto X Flagship Series to Moto Z: Report

In an interesting development, Lenovo-owned Motorola is reportedly planning to ditch the Moto X brand and rename its flagship handset series. The company is pegged to release two flagship smartphones this year under a new 'Z' series brand name for its flagship smartphones.

Motorola has been traditionally selling its premium flagship smartphones under the Moto X brand. However, noted tipster Evan Blass reports that the company is looking to do a brand re-jig, and is keen on calling its flagship smartphone series Moto Z going forward.

According to the rumour mills, the two upcoming Moto flagships this year have been codenamed Vector Thin and Vertex. Blass asserts that Vector Thin is the more premium smartphone, and will be the one that will be called Moto Z. The Vertex is expected to be dubbed as Moto Z Play.

Motorola is doing more brand tweaks by replacing the Verizon Wireless' Droid Turbo and Droid Maxx, and renaming them to 'Droid Edition'. The report also talks about the much rumoured 'Amps' - the modular backplates Motorola plans to introduce with the flagship smartphones this year. Blass claims that these backplates will be called MotoMods, and not Amps.

Blass reiterates Lenovo plans to unveil these smartphones at the Lenovo Tech World Show in San Francisco starting from June 9. Recapping previous leaks, the Moto Z aka Vector Thin is expected to come with a 5.5-inch QHD display, a Snapdragon 820 processor, 3GB or 4GB of RAM, 16-megapixel rear camera, 32GB of inbuilt storage, 2600mAh battery, and be sleek at just 5.2mm in thickness.

The Vertex aka Moto Z Play will sport a 5.5-inch full-HD display, a Snapdragon 625 SoC, 2GB of RAM, a 13-megapixel rear camera, 16GB and 32GB storage variants, a 3500mAh battery, and be a bit thicker than the Moto Z Play with thickness of 7mm.

As rumoured, the smartphones will come with 16-pin connectors at the back to attach the modular backplates aka the MotoMods. Motorola is said to planning on releasing six backplates at launch, namely - a battery pack, a rugged cover fitted with a wide-angle lens, a camera-style grip complete with a flash module and optical zoom, a stereo speaker setup, and a pico projector.