Google has definitely did not given up on the modular smartphone concept, also known as the Project Ara, and has announced and scheduled the first Ara Developers' Conference for April 15th.

Back when the sale of the Motorola part to Lenovo was announced, Google pointed out that it would keep the Project Ara for itself and push it to its Android team. First announced back in October last year when Motorola was still in Google's clutches, Project Ara is now described as the smartphone "designed exclusively for 6 billion people." Google's aim is essentially to design a smartphone where users can chose what the phone does and what it actually looks like.

In order to speed things up, Google has now scheduled the first Ara Developers Conference which will kick off in Mountain View, California on April 15th. The conference will be streamed online and will be focused on the alpha release of the ARA Module Developers' Kit (MDK), which should be released in April, if all goes well. The MDK will be "a free and open platform specification and reference implementation that contains everything you need to develop an Ara module."

According to Google's Paul Eremenko, who is a member of Google's Advanced Technology and Projects group, a functioning prototype of the Ara smartphone is just "weeks away" and hopefuly we will see it sooner rather than later. Google's focus for the Project Ara is to bring a smartphone which entry-level model will not be higher than US $50 and include touchscreen, WiFi and baseplate or circuitry to run it. Google apparently also plans to open kiosks where you would actually be able to buy additional modules to add to your phone allowing you to buy it up to high-end model.

While the functioning prototype is weeks away, Google expects to have a launch version ready for the first quarter of 2015.

In the meantime you can check out more about Project Ara here.