Motorola XOOM Confirmed for “End of February” Release, DROID BIONIC in Q2 (Updated)

We’re listening in to Motorola’s earnings call right now and CEO Sanjay Jha just confirmed that the Motorola XOOM will definitely be out in February.  At first he said “end of February” but he’s come back on now to confirm that it will definitely be in February which could mean middle of the month.  The device as expected, will ship as a 3G device, but will be upgradeable to 4G LTE shortly there after.  We thought we heard March, but it could have been May.

Update 3:31PM:  Sanjay was asked about gross margins for tablets and how subsidized pricing would work with them and his answer wasn’t straight-forward as you can imagine.  He actually wouldn’t confirm either way if there will be subsidy with the XOOM, but did bring up some variables they look at in the tablet market which you’ll find interesting.  He made reference to 3G/4G vs wifi-only tablets and also different sized tablets including 7″ and 10″ variants.  We may be jumping at nothing here, but it sure sounded like wifi-only and 7″ tablets are in their plans.

Update 3:41PM:  Asked about future plans for Blur and they are as expected, still using it.  They think it helps them understand their consumers and what they want, which means they don’t read this blog nearly enough!

Note:  I should also point out that Sanjay confirmed Q2 for the DROID BIONIC and the 4G LTE XOOM which puts them in play some time before July.  Our May date is looking good so far.

If you are interested in their earnings numbers, you can check the press release here.

We should point out that their Q1 2011 numbers show that they are bracing for the i*hone landing on Verizon.  Without a major release in early Q1, they are expecting to see losses of anywhere from .09 to .21 cents per share and a $26 to $62 million net loss.  The XOOM will likely help keep that number closer to the $26 million mark and then carry them through Q2 alongside the Atrix 4G.