Motorola’s working on a new ‘top tier flagship’: latest Pixel 4 rival could arrive very soon

Motorola is working on a new top tier flagship smartphone to take on the likes of the iPhone 11, Pixel 4 and Galaxy S10.

Motorola vice president and general manager Antony Barounas confirmed the news when asked by Trusted Reviews if the company plans to release a top tier, £500-£1000 smartphone in Europe in the near future.

“Yes. Motorola is a company that has always been perceived as a premium brand. Step by step we want to conquer the mid-tier and then the top-tier market. To do that you need to have premium phones,” he said.

“This is where we see a big shift in the market, especially in the next 12 months. So yes you should expect to see something.”

Related: Best smartphone 2019

Motorola has been oddly silent in the top tier European smartphone market this year. The company has launched a wealth of new mid-range Motorola One family smartphones, like the Motorola One Vision and Motorola One Action. But the closest it has come to launching a flagship is the Moto Z4, which is only available in the US and features distinctly middling specs and a mid-range price tag.

Barounas didn’t reveal any further details about the company’s flagship phone plans, or if he was referring to the hotly anticipated new Razr Phone 2019. The Razr Phone 2019 is the company’s first folding phone. It’s expected to launch later this year and be a key rival to the Samsung Galaxy Fold and Huawei Mate X. It’s also expected to carry a pretty hefty £1000-plus price tag.

Details about the Razr Phone are few and far between. The only detail we have is that it will have an atypical folding screen that lets you fold it in on itself, like the original Razr’s clamshell design.

Samsung is also rumoured to be working on a fixed version of the Galaxy Fold. The fixed fold is expected to be a 0.5 upgrade to the unreleased original, which suffered from durability issues.