Motorola not being "phased out", but rebranded as Moto and Vibe

Two years after taking over the troubled Motorola brand, Lenovo is set to shift focus to two of its smartphone brands Moto and Vibe.A statement published last Friday sought to clarify what Motorola Mobility COO Rick Osterloh said at last week's CES conference that Lenovo would phase out the 88-year-old Motorola brand."We are not abandoning the iconic Motorola brand" and that "it will continue to be used on packaging and elsewhere"."Motorola Mobility isn’t going away," the blog post said. "In fact, just last August Motorola Mobility assumed a much more central role in Lenovo’s smartphone business."As a wholly owned subsidiary, we remain the engineering, design and manufacturing engine for all of the Mobile Business Group’s smartphones and wearables.""This latest move is all about where we focus our brand marketing efforts in the future. That will be on our two hero smartphone brands: Moto and Vibe, with the Lenovo corporate brand tying all of our consumer and commercial products together more holistically."The post concludes that the Motorola legacy was "near and dear" to the company and will be continued under Lenovo.The Chinese computer technology powerhouse bought Motorola from Google in 2014 after the launch of Moto G, an Android smartphone that shook up the Motorola business since the wildly successful Motorola Razr back in 2003.