Forty years ago A device was arriving on the market that was destined to change the way we communicate forever: the Motorola DynaTac 8000X was the first mobile phone on the market. He weighed almost a kilo and could only save 30 numbers – but he started the mobile revolution we are still experiencing today.
Motorola DynaTac 8000X, 40 years ago the first mobile phone was born
Of “mobile” had nothing at all. The Motorola DynaTac 8000Xknown as “the building block” in the industry, was the first portable cell phone to be sold March 6, 1983, ushering in a new era in the telecommunications industry. The device was not pocket-sized and resembled a walkie-talkie. It weighed 800 grams, was 25 centimeters tall. Furthermore, only 30 phone numbers could be stored and it took 10 hours for a full battery charge. Not quite the specs we’d look for in a smartphone today.
Yet the base price was 3995 dollars, a high figure for the time. Motorola had pioneered cellular phone calls a decade earlier with the first wireless phone call being made by engineer Martin Cooper in 1973. After obtaining Federal Communications Commission clearance for the Dynatac 8000X, it achieved real sales success. The company dominated the market until 1998, when it was overtaken by Nokia. Currently, Motorola is a division of the Chinese Lenovo Group.
From the 1980s, the cellphone began rapid expansion, with the one million user mark just seven years after the debut of the Dynatac 8000X. Also thanks to the success of films such as Wall Streetcon Michael Douglas who was holding this cell phone to his ear to find the best deals.
It will have to be 24 years before it arrives the iPhone, launched in 2007, which has normalized the Internet connection and access to mobile apps and services. Now it is difficult to live without a smartphone – indeed, there is a high probability that you are reading this article from a mobile device.
However, the sector is currently facing global economic difficulties and saturation in the more mature markets, registering a decline of 11.3% in 2022.
In this time of discussion of VR headsets as the next big step for the communications market, one thing remains certain: this Motorola device, which turns 40 today, has dator the start of a huge revolution in the world of communications. Albeit with a tiny monochrome screen and weighing almost a kilo.