NOKIA PLANS TO PRODUCE MOBILE COMPUTING DEVICES

Is Nokia looking to play ASUS and Acer at their own hardware game?

Technology companies intent on increasing their product reach by implementing manufacturing crossovers seems to be a habit that’s gathering momentum.
Moreover, while Netbook heavyweights ASUS and Acer have recently expanded into the world of smartphones, mobile phone titan Nokia has announced a shift of focus towards computer hardware.
Speaking in a recent Finnish television interview with YLE, Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo has said the Espoo-based market leader is considering plans to begin production of its own line of mobile computer systems, describing the new devices as capable of merging the features and functions of a PC along with those of a mobile handset.
“We don’t have to look even for five years from now to see that what we know as a mobile phone and what we know as a PC are in many ways converging,” said Kallasvuo regarding a move towards portable computing. “We are looking very actively also at this opportunity.”
According to tech publication ITProPortal, a related report offered up by the “well-connected” folks at Unwiredview claims Nokia has already progressed its plans to the point of creating a functional mobile computing device built on an open-source Linux operating system.
The report also suggests the platform could ultimately function on Nokia's own Symbian operating system and physically resembles the Nokia N800 touch-screen Tablet (pictured), which, if true, would eliminate a fully-fledged move into the ultra-portable Netbook or traditional notebook computer category.
Other features apparently crammed into the diminutive device, which is supposed to be on schedule for a 2011 arrival, includes ARM’s multi-core Cortex A9 Sparrow processor and a somewhat unusual button-equipped keyboard with diamond-shaped keys.

STORM USERS SAY: BLACKBERRY STORM IS NO iPHONE KILLER

The gales of the Blackberry Storm just weren't strong enough to wash away Apple's iPhone success. Between its average reviews and customer complaints over bugs and OS stability, the Storm seems to have severely underperformed in customer satisfaction. And now, the latest figures from Blackberry maker Research In Motion (RIM) show that it has underperformed in sales, too.
Only half million Blackberry Storm devices were sold in the U.S. since November, according to the Wall Street Journal . During the same holiday period, Apple sold more than two million iPhones, totaling over a quarter of the North American smartphone market. RIM's shares have also dropped more than 5 percent since news broke that Storm users are still unhappy with their experience on the device.
Speculation from various sources blames Blackberry Storm's woes on the phone's software glitches, crashes, and bugs. Many of these these problems occurred because of Research In Motion's eagerness to make the Storm available in time for the 2008 holiday season, starting with Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year.
RIM tried to address users' complaints and released a software fix for the Blackberry Storm in December. Despite that fix, many users remained unsatisfied with the device's basic functionality, such as the lack of a conventional QWERTY keyboard when the phone is used in portrait mode-a feature that's available on the iPhone and other touch-screen smart phones. RIM officials acknowledged Storm's further software issues and promised another update that will solve many of the phone's problems.
But the Blackberry Storm will soon face even more competition. A new smartphone battle is coming up this year with the imminent launch of Palm's much-hyped Pre. Nokia is also joining the game with its N97, so RIM should address users' concern quickly.

NEW SAMSUNG ANDROID

Samsung will roll out a mobile phone based on the Google Android operating system by the second quarter of 2009, according to a report from Korean news agency ETNews. While details are sketchy, Samsung will reportedly release the phone via cellular carriers Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile.
The phone will likely be a touchscreen model similar to Samsung's Instinct and Omnia handsets, both of which more closely resemble the Apple iPhone than HTC's less sleek T-Mobile G1, currently the only Google Android phone on the market. Samsung's device will provide all the Google essentials we'd expect, include search, mapping, mail, and instant messaging, the report states, but it's a safe bet that other Google tools will be added as well.
It would appear that Samsung has high hopes for its Google phone. It has reportedly "accelerated" development of the project, adding 30 Linux and Java experts to a design team that now has up to 80 members. It seems likely that Samsung will beat other Open Handset Alliance members to market, including Asus, LG, Motorola, and Sony Ericsson, all of whom have Android-based projects in the works.
The growing interest in the Android OS, as well as the staggering popularity of the iPhone, which now commands over 30 percent of the U.S. smartphone market, is more bad news for Microsoft's Windows Mobile, which is declining in popularity among end users and phone manufacturers alike.
Let's hope the Samsung handset will borrow some of the iPhone's elegance, but a slide-out keyboard would be nice too.

CHEAP SMARTPHONE TREND START-OFFS WITH NEW NOKIA E63

Nokia's E63 smartphone, announced Wednesday, will cost €199 (US$250) before any subsidies -- a price that puts the phone maker ahead in a burgeoning price war and which one analyst described as "eye-popping."
The E63 is a qwerty messaging device, with a 2.36-inch display, a 2-megapixel camera and two customizable home screen views for both business and personal use. Nokia promises easy e-mail setup and users can surf the Internet using a WLAN.
The phone also comes with support for Files on Ovi, so anyone buying the handset will have access to 1G byte of free online file storage, according to Nokia.
"Nokia has never made any secret of the fact that it wanted to take S60 to aggressive price points and with a retail price of 199 it is certainly showing Nokia can do that," said Ben Wood, director of research at CCS Insight.
Other phone vendors will have no choice but to follow Nokia's lead. Companies that want to be competitive have to match the best prices in the market and with the economy being what it is pricing will become increasingly important, according to Wood.
"Given the current economic climate, price is becoming more important than ever before, because what we are seeing is that the major network operators are starting to take subsidies out of phones, so if you want well-featured phones bought by consumers you have to supply them at an aggressive price," Wood said.
Malik Saadi, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media, has identified the same trend -- the price war will only intensify at a time when new entrants into the market are increasing their pressure on competitors to reduce prices, mainly for feature phones and smartphones, he wrote in a recent research note.
Nokia isn't the only company that plans to put smartphone pricing under pressure. Huawei and newcomer INQ are also getting into the game. Huawei -- a company that has already turned mobile infrastructure pricing on its head -- said last week that it plans to launch both Android and Symbian phones during the first half of next year. And INQ is launching Thursday, with its devices designed to stimulate mass-market mobile data use, featuring a select set of geographically relevant social networking, e-mail and instant messaging applications, according to a company presentation.

GOOD NEWS FOR NOKIA TWEAKERS-Nokia Goes After Google with Open Source Symbian

Nokia has announced its Symbian mobile operating system will join the likes of Android and will become an open source operating system. The announcement was made Tuesday at the Smartphone Show in London and is seen as a bid to maintain and possibly grow its developer base. This move comes at the same time Google makes its Android source code available to developers. The Nokia news contradicts previous reports on Nokia adopting Android OS.

Fantastic Four
With four major mobile platforms competing with each other now -- from Apple, Blackberry, Google and Nokia -- the competition to gain our hearts and money in exchange for a mobile phone just got hotter. While Apple and Blackberry's platforms are proprietary, Google and Nokia's are left now to battle on the open source realm.
T-Mobile G1, using Google's Android OS, goes on sale today. The next two contenders in the touchscreen smartphone challenge will be the Blackberry Storm (available later this year) and Nokia 5800 Music Express (available early next year).

Style Counts
The actual hardware design of the smartphone may play a big part in driving sales. But the software inside is what actually makes all the difference on the long run. Can you imagine Apple's iPhone running a cumbersome OS with little innovation such as gesture support? That's why Google never built its own gPhone hardware and is focused on nurturing the Android OS. The Android OS will be used by various manufacturers such as Kyocera who will now be able to focus more on the hardware.
Up until now Nokia built its own hardware and develops its own software for its phones just as Apple and Blackberry do. That will change once the Symbian OS becomes an open source project welcoming many more developers to help build the OS. And certainly Nokia will not be the only one benefiting from open source community. Nokia shares its platform with Samsung and Sony Ericsson -- both members of the Symbian Foundation.
Between Nokia's existing support for its Symbian OS and Google's growing support for Android are shaping up to be quite the mobile OS smackdown.
Only time will tell whether Nokia or Google will be the dominant open source smartphone OS. But placing a bet is quite hard to make taking in consideration Nokia's experience with mobile phones and Google's long term commitment to innovation.