Motorola Mobility’s low-cost Moto G smartphone has proved to be something of a hit in some markets, with the company securing 6 per cent of the British smartphone market in the period to February 2014, according to Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.

According to the research company, buyers have a “very specific consumer profile”. Almost half are in the 16 to 24 age bracket, 83 per cent are male, and “generally they come from lower income groups, with 40 per cent earning under £20,000”.

Motorola announced the device late last year, with the intention to challenge other device vendors who have targeted low-spending customers with aging devices or low-spec alternatives.

“Motorola was nowhere in Europe before the Moto G launched in November last year, but the new model has since boosted the manufacturer to 6 per cent of British sales. It highlights the speed at which a quality budget phone can disrupt a market,” said Dominic Sunnebo, strategic insights director at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.

Indeed, in recent years the Motorola brand has been all but absent in a number of markets where it formerly had a significant presence. Its success in the UK either highlights a continued value for the brand, or, as Kantar suggests, is driven by increasingly tech-savvy and price-sensitive customers.

“Some 40 per cent of British consumers are heavily influenced by internet reviews when deciding which mobile to buy and 48 per cent of Moto G sales were made online. With virtually no existing customers to sell to in Britain, the Moto G has stolen significant numbers of low-mid end customers from Samsung and Nokia Lumia,” Sunnebo continued.

The news will also be positive for Lenovo, the company in the process of acquiring Motorola Mobility from Google. While the unit has been loss-making for some time, the success of the Moto G – albeit limited on a global scale – does seem to indicate there is still a role for Motorola to play in today’s market.