Motorola takes on Apple’s ecosystem with Smart Connect

If you’re in the Apple ecosystem, moving from your iPhone to iPad or Mac computer and back again is relatively quick and painless. With iCloud, all your data is synced including your messages, calendar events, emails, and so on. But if you’re using Android on a Windows PC, that becomes trickier. This is something Motorola is looking to solve with Smart Connect.

This is a new software system developed by Lenovo and Motorola. The idea is that it will help unify our devices together to create what they call a “multi-device experience”. This means that as long as all your devices are connected to the same network, the ecosystem is already up and running.

Users can use their mouse and keyboard to control multiple devices. Users can also share files, stream videos from one device to another, and more. Some useful productivity features include a smart clipboard. This lets users copy an item from one device and paste it in another. There’s also a webcam feature that lets users use their phones as their PC’s webcam.

Before you get too excited, note that Smart Connect will only work with Lenovo tablets and PCs as well as Motorola phones. For those using a different brand, you’re out of luck. That being said, Lenovo and Motorola aren’t alone in trying to establish their own ecosystem. Samsung has something similar as well, and we expect that more companies will head down this path.