Motorola Mobility is looking to gain a home team advantage. As a press release put out by the company explains, today there are more than 130 million smartphones in use in America and not one of them was made or assembled here. That is about to change as Motorola announced this week that it is opening a plant in Fort Worth, TX where the company will employ up to 2,000 individuals to assemble 70 percent of its new Moto X flagship smartphone.
The company said it would benefit by moving product assembly of the Android device closer to its engineers based in California and Illinois. According to a company statement, Motorola will "be able to iterate on design much faster, create a leaner supply chain, respond much more quickly to purchasing trends and demands, and deliver devices to people here much more quickly."
Motorola's move follows an announcement last year that Apple planned to move manufacturing of some Mac computers to the U.S. this year. Apple CEO Tim Cook has said the company would like to bring some iPhone production to the U.S., as well. Other electronics manufacturers including Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo also do some assembly at domestic plants.
- Moto X: The First Smartphone Assembled in the USA - Motorola Mobility LLC
- Dennis Woodside on the Genesis of the Moto X, Ditching Tablets and Learning to Say No - AllThingsD
- Motorola Opening Nation's First Smartphone Assembly Plant - The Associated Press/CBS News
- Motorola's Moto X phone to be made in the U.S. - CNN
- Motorola's Moto X Phone Will Be Made in America - ABC News