You might recall all of the early talk about Project Ara, a modular phone project that Motorola Mobility was planning on getting into. The recent sale of Motorola Mobility to Lenovo saw Google hanging onto the Project Ara concept (as well as a few others. And all the patents) and the search company has, through Ara project leader Paul Eremenko, given out a few details about what they have in mind.

Speaking to Time, Eremenko said that the project is looking at creating a base for their modular smartphone that costs $50 (R550) that consists of the phone’s display, frame and WiFi connection. Everything else will be slotted into the device and the team behind Ara is hoping that these components will be hot-swappable – including the battery. There is talk of something called mobile kiosks, which will see a virtual assistant helping to design a user’s Ara device by checking out responses to something like the photos taken with the user’s phone and possibly suggesting a better camera module to improve that response.

Eremenko said that the team working on the Ara smartphone is “…finishing up work on a functioning prototype, which will be ready within weeks, with a version ready for commercial release in the first quarter of 2015.”

Google has also launched a new Project Ara website, where they have announced that the first Ara Developer’s Conference will be taking place online in the form of a livestream and an interactive Q&A. They’re looking for developers to register, both for the conference and for their Scout program.

Source: Digital Trends