Nokia working on Windows Phone 8 Apollo devices

Tom Warren of The Verge has claimed that Nokia has already started working on two new Windows Phone 8 Apollo based smartphones codenamed - Prodigy and AC/DC respectively.

The Windows Phone 8 Apollo shares the native code very similar to the Windows 8 OS and will be tightly integrated with the latter. Windows Phone 8 Apollo is expected to launch sometime later this year and if Microsoft sticks to the timeline then it would be in November. That launch may take place before or after the anticipated launch of Android 5.0 Jelly Bean mobile operating system.

Besides Nokia, HTC has also reported to have working on the next generation smartphones for Windows Phone 8 Apollo update. Apparently, these handsets will be mobile operator exclusive and announced specifically for US region.

When Microsoft announced Windows Phone 7, the first handsets running that mobile operating system were mostly headed for US with carrier exclusivity. Same process is likely to be followed for the Windows Phone 8 launch. However, Microsoft plans to release Windows Phone 8 just along-side the Windows 8 due to similarity of code and loads of inter-related features.

Nokia is working on two Windows Phone 8 Apollo smartphones - one high end device dubbed Prodigy and a mid-range device dubbed AC/DC. From the codenames point of view, these high end handsets do appear music-centric.

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Nokia Lottery not a Scheme - A Scam confirms Nokia

Global mobile phone manufacturer Nokia has released an official communication for its users worldwide urging them not to fall prey to a lottery scam that has gone viral in past few days. According to Nokia, several users worldwide have been posting their details and email addresses on several Nokia forums awaiting results for the "Nokia lottery" they had participated in.

"Nokia is not involved in any such lottery program and any such message or email claiming to be form Nokia is a scam and Nokia is urging their users to not to participate or reply to any such email or SMS that asks them to reply back with their back account details or asks them for a small sum of money that will be utilised to enter their name in the draw," said the Finnish company in a release.

"Nokia is encouraging users to ignore or delete the messages and to resist the temptation to reply. If you're unsure of who the message has come from, you should most probably delete the message. Certainly don't respond with your personal details. If you reply, or act on any other requested action it's possible your personal information could be misused," the mobile phone manufacturer further warned.

Scammers usually target mobile phone users luring them to give in their bank account details or even money in exchange of a chance to win a large sum of money.

Nokia is aware of the situation and hence they want all the users to use extreme caution while dealing with any such email or message claiming to get them a large sum of money for free or by just giving they bank information where they can transfer the sum to.

Users should not respond or action on any such email or message and should delete it without paying any attention towards them. Messages are crafted in such a way that many people fall prey for them and end up losing money and vital information. So until and unless the message is from a trusted sender, you should avoid responding to the same.

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183 mn mobile phones shipped to India in 2011 says Reports - Nokia Leading the race

Mobile phone shipments to India grew by 10 per cent to 183.4 million units in 2011 against 166.5 million units in 2010, says a study.

According to a CyberMedia Research study, the smartphone segment grew 87 per cent to 11.2 million units in 2011 as against 6 million units in the previous year. On the other hand, feature phone shipments increased seven per cent to 172.2 million units in 2011 from 160.5 million units in 2010.

Nokia retained its leadership position with 31 per cent share of the overall mobile phone segment, followed by Samsung at No 2 with 15 per cent and Micromax at No 3 with 5 per cent share in terms of sales (unit shipments) during 2011.

The Finnish firm was also numero uno in the smartphones segment with a 38 per cent share, followed by Samsung with 28 per cent share in 2011. RIM dropped to third place with a 15 per cent share, the study said. In 2011, the India smartphones market witnessed the launch of 150 models by over 30 vendors.

"In 2012, the proportion of smartphones with extended features like NFC and 3D gaming is likely to increase. It will be interesting to see how Microsoft and Nokia take their partnership to the next level with a new range of smart devices based on the Windows 7.5 Mango OS platform," CyberMedia Research Lead Telecoms Analyst Naveen Mishra said.

With established players like Nokia and Samsung expanding their dual-SIM portfolio, the multi-SIM category saw an year-on-year increase of 61 per cent in shipments and accounted for 57 per cent of the total shipments in 2011.

Nokia (13 per cent share) displaced G'Five to capture the top slot, while Korea's Samsung, with eight per cent share, pushed Micromax to the third slot.

"The innovative products in the Finnish vendor's portfolio helped Nokia become the market leader in the category," CyberMedia Research Telecoms Practice Analyst Tarun Pathak said. The year 2011 also saw about 250 3G handsets from about 30 vendors hitting the market and accounted for nearly 18 million units, a year-on-year growth of 153 per cent.

Nokia again emerged as the market leader in this category, followed by Samsung and RIM. "3G is a relatively new phenomenon in India with active subscribers estimated at only 15 million as of December 2011. This may be directly attributed to the lack of 3G network availability in many locations and the poor quality of service experienced by existing subscribers," Mishra said.

It will be interesting to see how new alliances and offerings emerge from handset vendors, service providers and content developers to target mobile subscribers with innovative device plus data service bundles, he added.

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Nokia unveils 41 MegaPixel SmartPhone-Camera | Camera-SmartPhone

Is it a smartphone with a camera or a camera with a phone?

Struggling cell phone maker Nokia has unveiled two new handsets that it hopes will revive its fortunes at the start of the world's largest mobile phone trade show on Monday -- including one with an eye-popping 41-megapixel camera.

Chief executive Stephen Elop told reporters at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that the new phones -- a low-price $250 smartphone that runs the Windows Phone operating system and the PureView 808 which sports the staggeringly high-resolution 41-megapixel camera -- demonstrates "the actions necessary to improve the fortunes of Nokia."

"With great products for consumers, I think the rest will fall into place," Elop said.
The PureView is also notable for the software powering it, Symbian -- which PCMag.com smartphone analyst Sascha Segan described as "the awkward, decade-old OS that Nokia has said it's phasing out in favor of Windows Phone."

Segan, reporting from the conference in Spain, noted that U.S. users were unlikely to get a chance to use the amazing camera, where the unpopularity of the Symbian OS would hamper the phone's success -- 41-megapixel camera or no.

Neil Mawston, a London-based analysts for Strategy Analytics, agreed that Nokia's new camera phone is impressive -- but that markets were expecting more.

"Technologically it is 'wow' but they have integrated it into a Symbian phone which is viewed as, rightly or wrongly, yesterday's technology, whereas I think there was some expectation that it might be in a Windows phone -- which is tomorrow's technology," Mawston said.

Nokia has lost its once-dominant position in the global cell phone market, with handsets running on Google's Android software and iPhones enjoying booming popularity.

The Finnish company is attempting a comeback with smartphones using Microsoft's Windows software in what Elop has called a "war of ecosystems."

"We will accelerate our global reach with new mobile devices and services," Elop said.
Malik Saadi, an analyst at the London-based Informa Telecoms & Media, said the introduction of Nokia's new Lumia 610 smartphone means the company is "now one step closer to bringing its [Windows Phone 7] to the entry-level smartphone segment" and "clearly shows strong dedication" by Nokia to its Windows strategy and smartphones for the non-U.S. market.

Nokia launched its new Windows Phone 7 in October, eight months after Elop announced a partnership with Microsoft, in a major strategy shift for the firm. Nokia said it would gradually replace the old Symbian platform used in its smartphones with the Windows operating system.

The new phones were introduced less than three weeks after Nokia announced plans to stop assembling cellphones in Europe by the year-end as it shifts production to Asia and to cut another 4,000 jobs -- its latest attempts to cushion itself from stiff competition in the smartphone sector. The job cuts follow nearly 10,000 layoffs announced last year.

Once the bellwether of the industry, Nokia has lost its dominant position in the global mobile phone market, with Android phones and iPhones overtaking it in the growing smartphone segment. It's also been squeezed in the low-end by Asian manufacturers making cheaper phones, such as ZTE.

Nokia became the leading handset maker in 1998 and reached 40 per cent market share in 2008, but the company has gradually lost share since then -- falling to below 30 per cent last year.

Analysts said the new smartphone could attract users because of its low price but investors sent Nokia shares down more than 5 percent to €4.10 ($5.50) in afternoon trading in Helsinki, erasing a big boost it gained on Friday in anticipation of new announcements at the trade show.

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Nokia posts $1.38 bn loss in fourth quarter

Nokia posted a fourth-quarter net loss of (euro) 1.07 billion ($1.38 billion) as sales slumped 21 per cent even as the company's first Windows smartphones hit markets in Europe and Asia.

The loss compares with a profit of (euro) 745 million in the same period a year earlier.

Nokia said net revenue fell to (euro) 10 billion, from (euro) 12.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2010, with smartphone sales plunging 23 per cent.

Nokia has lost its once dominant position in the global smartphone market, with Android phones and iPhones overtaking it in the growing smartphone segment.

The Finnish company is attempting a comeback with phones using Microsoft's Windows software, and said it has sold "well over'' 1 million such devices since they hit the stores in November in Europe and Asia, and the US in January.

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Nokia India unveiled Nokia Money - Standalone Mobile Wallet Service

Nokia India today launched its own standalone mobile wallet service to provide a secure and convenient alternative to cash on a mass scale to cellphone customers.

Called Nokia Money, it is expected to offer a wide spectrum of mobile payment services to consumers who have a cellphone and want the convenience of making basic financial payments such as utility bills, top-ups, insurance premiums and tickets among others, without getting into the hassle of having access to a bank account or the Internet.

"There is a need for alternative financial payment instruments and the mobile handset offers a perfect mass platform to deliver these. Transaction costs on mobile devices are significantly lower. We bring multiple offerings and are developing an open ecosystem to deliver mobile money services to users depending on their need," Nokia Mobile Payment Services General Manager Gary Singh said here.

Customers will have to approach their local Nokia retail store offering this service to undergo a simple registration process, pay cash to load digital cash on to the wallet. The digital cash can then be used for making payments through an SMS.

As per RBI guidelines, this service doesn't require 'know your customer' or KYC documentation, since it is a closed wallet.

Nokia Money is independent of any mobile operator or individual banking network. Nokia has begun pre-loading the application on a wide range of Nokia mobile handsets across price points.

We guess everyone might be aware of a similar service launched by Google, called Google Wallet few months back.

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T-Mobile to sell Nokia Lumia 710 (Windows Mango smartphone) for just $49.99

T-Mobile USA and Nokia said today they will sell the Lumia 710, marking Nokia's push to re-enter the U.S. market in a real way.

With the Lumia 710, priced at $49.99 and available on January 11, Nokia and T-Mobile are going after consumers who own a basic cell phone, but have been hesitant to upgrade to a more complicated smartphone. The companies believe the low price of the handset, lower-priced data, and easier-to-use Windows Phone operating system will help people ease their way into a more sophisticated mobile device.

It will mark the first Nokia Windows Phone to hit U.S. shores. For T-Mobile, the more affordable device should help it sway smartphone newbies and more budget-conscious subscribers at a time when its highest-tier customers leave for carriers offering a better selection of phones.

"This is the right product to go after the 150 million feature phone users in the country," said Chris Weber, head of Nokia's North America business, adding that figure is twice the size of the current smartphone base.



Tags: Nokia Lumia 710 Windows Mango Smartphone Price in USA

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Nokia Kinetic – New Flexible Phone To Be Launched Soon

Nokia demonstrates yet another device- Nokia Kinetic, a new phone model that is flexible and could be bent and twisted easily. This model has been revealed this October in London at the Nokia World 2011 Nokia technology show.

It is a 5 – inch model resembling a tablet. It has a flexible AMOLED screen. It offers two applications- a photo viewer and a music player. The phone has two modes – the convex and the concave. To select some icon on the screen, the phone has to move in a convex position and to move back to the earlier page, the phone has to be brought back in the concave direction. The motion of the device in such a manner can lead to zoom in and zoom out of photos just by twisting the model in forward or backward direction respectively. The same kind of twist is required to start or stop a music application. The bending of the model form one side to the other side would offer the user to have a look through the music gallery and the picture albums. The phone is well-suited for the modern operating systems

Though this technology appears to be good, there are a lot of restrictions that will come in the way of its development. It cannot be operated with one hand. There is no record so as to how the handset will respond to unintentional changes that occur in the shape of the handset while it is being kept in pocket. But this phone is believed to provide a great experience while playing games on it.

The same concept of developing such a flexible model had earlier been put forth by Synaptics and Kyocera, but they failed miserably. This time its Nokia Kinetic to come all the way and to crack the code!!!

Source: CE

Tags: Nokia Kinetic, Flexible Mobile Phones,Nokia World 2011

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Nokia Lumia 800 - The First Real Windows Phone said Microsoft

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Launch :

NOKIA has launched its long-awaited first Windows 7 smartphones on October 26 2011 at Nokia World 2011 Event, hoping to claw back market share it has lost in the smartphone race to chief rivals, Apple, Samsung and Google.

But some analysts say it may be too little, too late, for the world's top mobile phone maker.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Price Tag :

With price tags of $560 and $360, the Lumia 800 and 710 are based on Microsoft's operating system and come eight months after Nokia and the computing giant said they were hitching up.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Vs Samsung Smartphones & iPhones :

"Lumia is reasonably good ... but it's not an iPhone killer or a Samsung killer," Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics said.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Memory :

"But where Nokia does stand out is on their price - it looks like they are going to be very competitive."
Lumia 800, with Carl Zeiss optics and 16GB of internal memory, will be available in selected European countries in November, including France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain and Britain.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Availability in Market :

It will be sold in Hong Kong, India, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan before the year-end.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Technical Specifications :

Lumia 710, with a 1.4 GHz processor, navigational applications and Nokia Music - a free, mobile music-streaming app - will first be available in Hong Kong, India, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan toward the end of the year.

Nokia Share Prices :


The company's share price jumped almost 3 per cent in an otherwise depressed market on the Helsinki Stock Exchange but settled, closing almost unchanged at ($6.68).

Nokia Phone Statistics: 

Nokia, which claims 1.3 billion daily users, has been the world's biggest handset maker since 1998, selling 432 million devices last year - more than its three closest rivals combined.

But after reaching its announced global goal of 40 per cent market share in 2008, it has struggled against rivals making cheaper handsets in Asia, and its share has shrunk to 24 percent earlier this year.

Worse still, Nokia's sales in the more lucrative smartphone market crashed 39 per cent in the third quarter as it continued to be squeezed in the low end by Asian manufacturers like ZTE and in the high end by the iPhone, Research in Motion's Blackberry, Korea's Samsung Electronics and Taiwan-based HTC Corp.

Nokia Lumia Windows SmartPhone Rivals in Market :

The iPhone has set the standard for smartphones among many design-conscious consumers and the Blackberry has been the favourite of the corporate set.

Google's Android software has emerged as the choice for phone makers that want to challenge the iPhone.

Samsung and HTC - snapping at Nokia's heels for third place in topend smartphones behind the iPhone and Samsung - are the biggest users of the Android platform.

Nokia is still operating Symbian software, older than Apple's software and considered clumsy by many, although it has been upgraded. Nokia also introduced the MeeGo platform in its flagship N9 model launched last month.

Mr Elop has said Windows software will become the main platform for Nokia smartphones but that it won't stop developing Symbian or MeeGo.

Mr Mawston says Nokia has been pushed into a corner as Symbian was unable to compete with other operating systems and MeeGo took too long to develop.

"It's a risk that they may be juggling too many balls at once," Mr Mawston said.

"They were pushed into a multi-platform strategy for at least the short-term, but given the competitive situation with Symbian and MeeGo they really had no choice but to develop a third (platform) and juggle all three at once."

Mr Elop described the Lumia phones as a "new dawn" for Nokia.

"Lumia is light ... Lumia is the first real Windows Phone," Mr Elop declared to the London audience.

He acknowledged that since he took over the Nokia leadership a year ago there had been "some difficult moments and some tough decisions to make," including more than 12,000 layoffs, but was upbeat about the future.

"Eight months ago, here in London we outlined a new direction for Nokia," Mr Elop said. "Since then we've gone through a significant transition and we are playing to win - no holding back, no hesitation, no second guessing."

Nokia, which according to Strategy Analytics, is the world's top seller of dual SIM card handsets, sold 18 million such devices in the third quarter.

"Dual SIM is really something Nokia should have been doing in 2007 and 2008 when the market really started rocketing quite aggressively," Mr Mawston said
"Like with smartphones really, they're two or three years behind and are gradually playing catch-up."

Nokia Lumia First Windows SmartPhone :

 Samsung and HTC denied to comment on this "First Windows Phone " Tag.

Courtesy: news.com.au

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Nokia launched Nokia 600, Nokia 700, Nokia 701 with NFC technology

 Nokia has launched three new phones Nokia 600, Nokia 701 and Nokia 700. All the products are believed to have a support from Symbian Belle’s 'Just Tap’ Near Field Communication (NFC) technology where Nokia 700 possesses a compact touch screen, Nokia 701 deserves applaud for finest mobile display and Nokia 600 can be considered as ‘loudest entertainment smartphone’.

The company has kept the product cost affordable and tagged the Nokia 600, Nokia 700 and Nokia 701 with price of 12,999, 18,099, and 18,999 respectively. The Vice- President and Managing Director of the company, D Shivakumar, along with Shahrukh Khan has launched the mobile phones.

The Regional General Manager- South, Nokia India, T. S. Sridhar, has addressed audiences during the launch and notified that the smartphone market has experienced rapid changes, especially in Indian market and claimed that the market is at an interesting phase.” Consumers are looking beyond basic functionality, seeking innovative technology in all smartphones. We believe our latest range will push the boundaries for future devices in this segment”, added T. S. Sridhar.

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