Scared by the success of Motorola Moto E, India's Lava and Micromax launch their own cheap Android KitKat phones

posted by Florin T. / May 26, 2014, 9:09 PM

Scared by the success of Motorola Moto E, India's Lava and Micromax launch their own cheap Android KitKat phones

India is the world’s second largest mobile market, and, as you’d imagine, it’s very competitive. Apart from well-known international companies like Samsung, Apple, Sony or HTC, India has its own handset makers, some of which are quite successful there. Two of the local companies, Lava and Micromax, seem to be scared by the success of Motorola's Moto E, which was launched in India almost two weeks ago, and just flies off the (virtual) shelves. It appears that the Moto E is India’s most popular budget-friendly Android smartphone at the moment.

What makes the Moto E a great buy isn’t just its price (6,999 INR / $120), but also the fact that it offers pretty nice features (including a splash-resistant case), while running Android KitKat. Before the Moto E, there was no affordable smartphone to run Android KitKat out of the box in India. So Lava and Micromax introduced two new cheap handsets that address this issue, becoming their first KitKat smartphones.

Lava’s handset is called Iris X1. It will be available starting May 28, costing around $136 (7,999 INR). Its features include a 4.5-inch IPS display with 480 x 854 pixels, 8MP rear camera, 2MP front-facing camera, 1.2GHz quad-core Broadcom BCM23550 processor, 1GB of RAM, and 4GB of expandable internal memory.

Micromax’s KitKat smartphone is called Unite 2, and can already be purchased for the same price as the Moto E. The handset offers a 4.7-inch display with 480 x 800 pixels, 5MP rear camera, 2MP front-facing camera, quad-core 1.3GHz MediaTek MT6582M processor, 1GB of RAM, 4GB of internal memory, and microSD card support.

sources: Lava Iris X1, Micromax Unite 2, Moto E via AndroidOS.in

Related phones

View Full specs

PhoneArena Rating:

9.0

Read Full Review

User Rating:

9.3

Based on 6 Reviews

Display 4.3" 540 x 960 pixels

Camera 5 MP

Processor Qualcomm Snapdragon 200, Dual-core, 1200 MHz

Storage 4 GB + microSDHC

Battery 1980 mAh

FEATURED VIDEO

Options

52 Comments

1. sriuslywtf

Posts: 297; Member since: Jul 09, 2013

Iphones.. Iphones everywhere...

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:11 PM 1

41. The_Z

Posts: 2; Member since: May 27, 2014

Still....it looks better than your phone..!

posted on May 27, 2014, 8:47 AM 0

43. sgodsell

Posts: 7514; Member since: Mar 16, 2013

So this would be some of the first devices running a mediatek processor running KitKat then. Mediatek has been really bad with support for Android and linux. Not releasing source code in the past.

posted on May 27, 2014, 9:07 AM 1

2. ckoch125

Posts: 193; Member since: Oct 29, 2012

Looks like an iPhone knock off

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:12 PM 4

8. RaKithAPeiRiZ

Posts: 1488; Member since: Dec 29, 2011

no one will buy a thing that looks like a knock-off , people will surely buy more of the Moto E

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:48 PM 2

18. marcski07

Posts: 600; Member since: Apr 25, 2014

how can you be so sure? :))

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:59 PM 8

36. andynaija

Posts: 1264; Member since: Sep 08, 2012

It also doesn't look like it's running KitKat, looks more like Jellybean to me.

posted on May 27, 2014, 4:00 AM 0

3. fzacek

Posts: 2486; Member since: Jan 26, 2014

Their screen resolutions are lacking but the Iris X1 does look pretty sexy...

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:14 PM 1

4. zennacko unregistered

Lava = iPhone copy Micromax = Moto G + Lumia's baby lol

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:22 PM 4

5. Arte-8800

Posts: 4562; Member since: Mar 13, 2014

Who and why would anyone buy this cheap phone? Yuck cheap and low graded If I was poor I'd rather save up and buy a midrange or a highend phone.

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:25 PM 0

6. Commentator

Posts: 3723; Member since: Aug 16, 2011

A lot of other people would rather save up and feed their families.

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:29 PM 33

9. g2a5b0e unregistered

Priorities, man. Not everyone is aware of what that word actually means.

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:59 PM 6

27. Arte-8800

Posts: 4562; Member since: Mar 13, 2014

I agree…. +1

posted on May 27, 2014, 12:27 AM 0

15. a_merryman

Posts: 749; Member since: Dec 14, 2011

Considering there is a sizable population of people in this world who live on less than $1 a day.....I don't think they're going to be wasting their money on $700 phones or even $400 phones.

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:25 PM 1

7. Planterz

Posts: 2120; Member since: Apr 30, 2012

The Lava looks nice, if a bit (or more than a bit) derivative. This is what the market needs. Quality phones that can be had for not much money. I only hope that these companies aren't just taking Motorola's lead in offering decently spec'd phones for cheap, but also keeping the interfaces as light as possible, which allows them to operate without the lag and frustration of a heavy skin and useless bloatware like TouchWiz.

posted on May 26, 2014, 9:41 PM 0

35. Kamehameha

Posts: 44; Member since: Apr 21, 2014

Their interfaces are quite light. Not only in terms of features but also optimizations. I wouldn't count on getting a decent experience from these phones.

posted on May 27, 2014, 3:58 AM 0

10. Awalker

Posts: 1986; Member since: Aug 15, 2013

The Moto E will be updated as newer versions of Android are released. I doubt the other phones will be updated at all.

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:04 PM 8

22. anuragudaybhat

Posts: 3; Member since: Nov 08, 2013

micromax announced that it will offer a guaranteed update to at least one future version.

posted on May 26, 2014, 11:38 PM 0

11. gaara6775

Posts: 738; Member since: May 20, 2014

there ui is hideous and after 8-9 months you see /feel lag like anything .it's impossible to use micromax or lava phones after 10months,there touch response gets bad and gameplay sucks. one of my friend has habit to buy 2nd hand phone and most of the time he chooses lava or karbonn as he can't afford micromax. I advised him to buy a 2nd hand HTC Sensation XE that is still better than any of these garbage phones. now it is even running on sense 5,but he never listen to me

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:11 PM 1

13. marbovo

Posts: 658; Member since: May 16, 2013

Some people never learn my friend

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:16 PM 0

42. The_Z

Posts: 2; Member since: May 27, 2014

Instead of nagging...go sell it online after "you" stop liking it.. Common sense helps sometimes

posted on May 27, 2014, 8:49 AM 0

12. marbovo

Posts: 658; Member since: May 16, 2013

The beauty of competition

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:15 PM 3

14. Pravas

Posts: 3; Member since: May 26, 2014

I dont think that they are scared of moto E.These companies have been offering super afordable smartphones from begining.Specially micromax offers nexus5 like spec at half of its price...So make sure to checkout their website before writing such article.

posted on May 26, 2014, 10:21 PM 0

17. shuaibhere

Posts: 1986; Member since: Jul 07, 2012

But they have no phone to compete with moto E... moto E will be updated constantly..and gives better experience, better battery life, better screen..don't forget built quality....