Motorola has had a difficult time with its Android updates, to say the least. To be fair, some blame could rightfully be laid on Verizon’s door, due to the wireless carrier’s infamously rigorous and dramatically slow validation process for these software updates. However, Motorola has definitely had some problems with missed deadlines, buggy updates and promised software packages that were ultimately dropped.

In fact, some users of the Droid Bionic, the manufacturer’s 2011 flagship, are only getting their Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich updates now, almost a month after the promised release window and over a year since said version of Google’s mobile operating system was first unveiled.

This may encourage some consumers to take Motorola’s update promises with a grain of salt, but as they say, hope does spring eternal. This time, the manufacturer has come out and said that the Droid Bionic as well as its early-2012 flagships, the Droid RAZR and Droid RAZR MAXX, would eventually get Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.

Unfortunately, aside from this statement, Motorola hasn’t given a release window for the software package. This could be seen as a bid to avoid the sort of backlash it has suffered over the Droid Bionic’s Ice Cream Sandwich delays. However, the fact that Motorola has canceled its Android 4.0 updates for a number of older handsets does place some doubt on its statement.

This could make more tech-savvy consumers a bit skittish on buying Motorola’s handsets in the future. Hopefully, Google’s acquisition of the mobile phone manufacturer isn’t just an effort to stockpile patents, and would also help filter into snappier software updates for Motorola smartphones.

We’ll have to wait and see in the coming few months, and hopefully, the manufacturer delivers and wipes away the bad taste that the Droid Bionic update left in everyone’s mouths.