Motorola launches Razr i Android smartphone with 2GHz Intel chip

Motorola has teamed up with Intel to launch the first 2GHz Android smartphone, as the manufacturer fights to re-establish itself as a major player in the handset market.

The Razr i was officially unveiled in central London earlier today, with executives from Motorola and Intel talking up the high-end device.

Key features of the Razr i include a 4.3in Super AMOLED edge-to-edge display, 8-megapixel camera, NFC technology and a mammoth 2000mAh battery pack. However, the unique selling point is the Intel Atom processor running at 2GHz, which Erick Reid, general manager of mobile and communications at Intel, claimed "outperforms leading dual-core devices".

We've spent years optimising Android for Intel.

"Consumers expect performance to be fast, they don't want to wait for a single thing. [The Razor i] is the first smartphone that can achieve the speed of 2GHz and that's a really big deal. It makes web browsing, more seamless - smoother, faster and more responsive. The camera experience is better [too]," he said.

"It's more than just the hardware. We've spent years optimising Android for Intel."

Despite Motorola talking the device up as a challenger to the iPhone 5, the Razor i will ship with Android Ice Cream Sandwich (4.0), which is not the latest version of the OS.

Users will have to wait for Intel to finish tweaking Android Jelly Bean (4.1) to run on its hardware and there is no specific timeframe for this.

There was also no mention of 4G compatibility, which is going to be increasingly important for UK users, as the infrastructure is about to be put in place with EE (Everything Everywhere) leading the charge.

Motorola claims the device will ship at the beginning of October. Retail partners will include Orange, T-Mobile, Phones4U, Virgin and Tesco Mobile.

Pricing is yet to be confirmed, but is expected to be in line with other high-end devices, such as the iPhone 5 and Samsung Galaxy S3.