Google’s Ara project looks ‘very desirable’

Dubai: It will be interesting to see if the modular phone, to be developed by Google’s Ara project, can make headlines in the fragmented and matured market, an industry expert said.

“The goal of Google is to build and design a phone to users’ needs,” Hamza Saleem, senior telecom analyst at research firm International Data Corporation (IDC), told Gulf News.

The big advantage is that consumers can swap from camera to the memory to the battery instead of changing the whole device.

The skeleton of the phone can be purchased for $50 (Dh183.50) and depending on consumers’ needs; they can increase the size of the battery or the memory.

“The Ara project looks very desirable. I think there will be a market for it but it is too early to tell,” he said.

Overall, innovation is probably not about improving the product but building a device that will make the smartphone accessible to the people who can’t afford costly devices.

The project will create a new ecosystem for developers, memory, microphones, speakers, etc, and the first modular phone is expected in January 2015.