Motorola and Sprint are testing an unannounced flagship smartphone with a Snapdragon 835 processor that supports the carrier's X16 Gigabit LTE service. The handset is reportedly the Moto Z (2017) and it's already been spotted in the wild.
Two popular smartphone makers debuted modular handsets last year that promised to allow users to add different accessories to the devices in a snap. LG was first out of the gate with the LG G5, which was launched during Mobile World Congress 2016. Motorola followed a few months later with the Moto Z. LG and Motorola clearly view modular smartphones very differently today.
While LG has abandoned the modular smartphone with its current flagship LG G6, Motorola sees a modular future and has already promised its next wave of Moto Mods for its Moto Z smartphones. Motorola currently sells the Moto Z series unlocked and has also partnered with Verizon to offer the Moto Z Droid series on the carrier's network.
Sprint Moto Z 2017
It now appears that Sprint will be getting the Moto Z (2017), as the carrier has been showing off a cloaked Motorola flagship smartphone that just so happens to be powered by the same Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor that's able to take advantage of its upcoming Gigabit LTE service.
"The lightning speeds of Gigabit Class LTE in the Snapdragon 835 mobile platform with X16 LTE can open up new applications and deliver new experiences to your mobile devices," said Mike Finley, senior vice president and president, Qualcomm North America, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. "We are proud to work together with Sprint to bring Gigabit Class LTE to the United States on a live commercial network for the first time, helping to ensure consumers have a superior connectivity experience. This is yet another step in accelerating global adoption of Gigabit Class LTE, enabling us to see a glimpse of our 5G future."
As you can see in the image above which was posted on Twitter, the Motorola smartphone shown off by Sprint has been placed inside a case with tape over it to hide the oval fingerprint scanner that was first spotted in a press image of an unannounced Motorola smartphone at Mobile World Congress 2017.
The Moto Z (2017) first made an appearance on Geekbench back in January and the report showed the smartphone running a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor and generous 4 GB of RAM on board. The handset is expected to be unveiled in June and we'll update you on any additional details as they become available.
