MOTONOW 2005
Although it's not headed for a US carrier, the new A732 is a tri-band GSM phone with one very interesting feature, which Motorola calls "Finger Writing Recognition" (FWR). It's a very unique technology from a company called Cirque that turns the normal-looking keypad into a very precise touchpad surface - just like on a laptop. Using Motorola's FWR software, you can simply trace out the shapes of letters with your fingertip to write text messages, for example.
It's a very cool technology, and works pretty well. It does recognize English, and is very fun to play with, but ultimately it's not faster than T9 for English. So the real targets are the Chinese-speaking markets in Asia, where it's faster to draw a character than tap it out.
This is actually Motorola's second FWR phone. The first was the A668, a clamshell model. The A732 is a slight downgrade, actually - it steps down to a VGA camera, from megapixel on the A668. But that's intentional - the A668 has been popular, but limited by price - now Motorola wants to bring the FWR technology to the mass-market with a more affordable model.
The A732 is perhaps more notable for being a slider model, something sorely lacking from Motorola's current lineup outside of Asia. Fortunately, Motorola's President of Mobile Devices Ron Garriques stood on stage and officially promised more sliders in 2006, and even hinted at a slider member of the RAZR family.
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