Motorola and Dutch designer Dave Hakkens have joined forces on Project Ara, a fully exchangeable, upgradable and sustainable phone with modular pieces that can be switched as required.

Technology is advancing rapidly, so phones frequently need to be upgraded as new phones are released at increasingly shorter intervals. Usually, when one phone component, such as the camera, breaks, consumers are forced to replace the whole phone, which is then thrown away.

Dave Hakkens developed a sustainable concept to solve this problem – Phonebloks – a phone with detachable components that can be changed easily, and is now collaborating with Motorola to bring it to fruition.

Motorola is also taking consumers’ thoughts into consideration to achieve the perfect phone. Interested consumers can sign up to provide input in a co-creation effort. The 100 most active early adopters will receive an early release of the finished phone at no cost. Watch Hakkens’ originl Phonebloks video above, and the follow-up below.

http://youtu.be/BaPf4ZIbDVM

http://youtu.be/oDAw7vW7H0c

The project permits the user to buy a very principle phone structure and add modules such as keyboard, battery and other sensors; in short; authorising its clients to customise their smartphone components. However it’s still an uncertainty to the experts on how big the swash would become. Besides that, Motorola has partnered Dutch designer Dave Hakkens, who is also the creator of Phonebloks, a unitary phone idea.

The firm in a blog spot also stated that it had been working on the project for more than a year; adding that “”We want to do for hardware what the Android platform has done for software – create a vibrant, third-party developer ecosystem”

This potential build-your-own phone (aka Lego Phone) era will give user the power to decide what one’s phone does, how it will look, where and what it’s originated from, how much it is and how long will it endure.

Last but not least, Project Ara will consist of what Motorola is calling an endoskeleton, the frame that will hold all the modules in place as Motorola plans to begin inviting developers to create modules in a few months time.

• It is predicted that 1.8bn phones will be sold this year, and that 1.5bn will be thrown away, or fall into permanent disuse.
• A total of 5.5bn are estimated to be in use worldwide.
• The environmental cost of making handsets includes mining for components.
• Used phones contain hazardous elements such as lead, mercury and chlorine, but also valuable metals like gold.
• Electronic waste is often exported to the developing world for processing – the work poisons workers and pollutes the environment.

Source: CCS Insight, United Nations

From existing tech like Face Unlock and Google Goggles to patent filings and Project Glass, it’s clear that Google sees augmented reality and image recognition as the future of computing. Previous to this acquisition, a source close to the company told the folks at TechCrunch earlier this week, Viewdle had already been in acquisition talks with Google around 2008. While we don’t know how much MMI paid for Viewdle, the rumor says it’s between $30 million and $45 million.

Viewdle was founded in Ukraine in 2006 and still keeps a considerable presence there, but the company is now headquartered in Silicon Valley.

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Via: TechCrunch