Nokia

Nokia shows off traffic monitoring application

Paul Mah — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 13:05:00 -0500

Despite its recent announcement to lay off 600 employees, Nokia has been hard at work cooking up the next innovation. The world's largest mobile phone maker is working together with GPS map maker Navteq--which Nokia acquired last year--to help drivers get a more accurate picture of traffic information. The idea is that real-time data can be anonymously collected by handsets equipped with GPS in order to provide up-to-date traffic information. Currently, a pilot project involving more than 10,000 handsets has already been launched in the San Francisco Bay Area. Moving ahead, this technology could really shine if it is able to react to current traffic conditions to recommend the best route for any given destination.

To read more:
- check out this article from Ars Technica

Related Article:
Nokia to lay off 600 employees

Nokia unveils new E-series smartphone

Paul Mah — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 07:09:55 -0500

Despite recent plans to lay off some 600 employees, phone juggernaut, Nokia--with some 40 percent of the market--certainly has no plans to take things lying down. It announced the new Nokia E63 earlier today, a QWERTY-based smartphone which builds upon the success of its earlier E71 messaging device. The E63 is expected to begin shipping in the coming weeks. It is the result of research by Nokia that shows consumers want a device that will work for their work and personal lives, yet be able to separate between the two. As such, the E63 comes with the ability to switch modes between a corporate view showing corporate emails, appointments and Intranet data, and a personal mode showing pictures of friends, personal email and shortcuts to personal websites. In addition, the Nokia E63 packs closer integration with the PC world by coming with a free 1GB of online file storage that users can access directly from their phone.

To read more:
- check out this Nokia press release

Nokia to lay off 600 employees

Paul Mah — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 04:13:37 -0500

Things might not be so rosy over at phone-maker Nokia. The number-one handset maker in the world announced Tuesday that it plans to cut about 600 employees. Nokia cited a weakening worldwide economy and the presence of new competitors as the reason for its move. Reflecting the company's shrinking market share, hundreds of these people will come from its headquarters in Finland, and about 130 people who do long-term research at the Nokia Research Center will be shown the door as well. This announcement comes on the heels of Nokia's third quarter financial report, which showed a drop of 28 percent in earnings, and a drop of 5 percent in revenue compared to last year. The company isn't staying still either, in June Nokia announced that it will buy all of Symbian and release the platform in an open-source model.

For more about Nokia's reduction of its workforce:
- check out this article from NetworkWorld

Related Article:
Nokia to buy all of Symbian

Open-sourced Symbian questioned

Paul Mah — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 04:52:50 -0400

Richard Windsor, a research analyst for technology and communication equipment at Nomura International, questioned whether Nokia's move to open source the Symbian platform a "win" for everyone involved. In the wake of Nokia's acquisition of Symbian Limited, the Finnish phone giant announced its plans to open source the venerable Symbian operating system.

While the move bodes well for the Symbian platform, non-Nokia licensees like Sony Ericsson will have "a massive disadvantage against Nokia," noted Windsor. One of the reasons is that its sheer volume allows Nokia to sell S60-based hardware at a staggering 40 percent lower price than its competitors. This may be the reason Sony Ericsson came up with phones based on Windows Mobile, such as the Xperia X1 Smartphone, which was unveiled earlier this year.

To read more on the issue of open sourcing the Symbian platform:
- check out this EETimes.com article

Symbian S60 5th Edition released

Paul Mah — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 05:46:55 -0400

Nokia's new touch-screen phone, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, will be powered by the newly released Symbian S60 operating system, 5th Edition. Besides building upon the Internet experience of earlier editions, the S60 5th Edition adds a touch user interface and sensor technology. Other additions to the OS would be enhanced resolution support, including widescreen mode, as well as video and photo editing features. In addition, support for open-source technology was also expanded via integrated support for Open C++. If this is your cup of tea, the 5th Edition SDK and associated tools for developers can be downloaded via the Forum Nokia website.

For more on the S60 5th Edition:
- check out this InformationWeek article

A look at Nokia Email

Paul Mah — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 11:10:42 -0400

A contributor over at Brighthand tested a new product called Nokia Email, which is the latest offering from Nokia's BetaLabs program. Nokia Email is essentially a downloaded application that connects to a service back end. In its current iteration, it has support for email accounts from Google, Yahoo (some countries only), and a few other webmail services, excluding Microsoft's Hotmail/Live service. Described as a product that functions well, it works by querying Nokia's service, which in turn connects to the desired email accounts.

To put it more concisely, it works just like the RIM-pioneered BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS). You might recall that Nokia recently stopped distributing the BlackBerry Connect application on its mmartphones; now you know why. Nokia Email is free, and you can download it here. It remains in beta, though the word "beta" is, more often than not, just a marketing tag.

Check out the full Nokia Email Review here:
- check out this article from Brighthand

Nokia removes BlackBerry Connect from E71 and E66

Paul Mah — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 04:40:26 -0400

Citing RIM as a competitor, Nokia has chosen to eliminate the BlackBerry Connect application from its new E71 and E66 smartphone offerings. What it means is that customers will not be able to use these devices to access BlackBerry-enabled corporate email systems. Somewhat ironically, E71 owners will still be able to sync the phone with Microsoft's Mail for Exchange, Nokia's own Intellisync, and various other consumer e-mail accounts such as Gmail and Hotmail. Not surprisingly, the primarily reason appears to be that Nokia is having a hard time penetrating the BlackBerry-dominated North American market. The recent launch of Apple's iPhone 3G, which is being pushed by AT&T, couldn't have made things any easier.

For more on Nokia's decision to drop BlackBerry Connect:
- check out this InformationWeek article

Symbian open to further ties with Google

Paul Mah — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:35:54 -0400

Smartphone software maker Symbian hinted that it could expand its collaboration with Google all the way to the operating system level. Nigel Clifford, Symbian chief executive, told reporters that Symbian "will be happy" to collaborate with Google whenever the opportunity presents itself. He added, "And that could be on the application level or that could be on the more fundamental operating system level." Google applications such as its maps and search engines are currently used by Symbian, of which 47.9 percent is owned by mobile phone giant Nokia. Over 200 million phones run on the Symbian operating system at the moment and Nokia wants to increase that with a bold $410 million plan to buy out the other shareholders of Symbian before making it available, royalty free, to other phone makers.

For more on mobile mail:
- check out this Washington Post article

Nokia acquisition of NAVTEQ cleared by EU

Paul Mah — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 10:32:55 -0400

The European Commission has OKed Nokia's proposed $8.1 billion acquisition of digital map maker NAVTEQ. In a written statement, an EU executive said, "The commission concluded that the transaction would not significantly impede effective competition in the European Economic Area, or any substantial part of it."

As Nokia looks for new sources of revenue from the maturing mobile phone industry, the NAVTEQ acquisition will give it a stronghold in the navigation business, considered to be one of the fastest-growing segments in the technology industry. With the EU approval under its belt, Nokia expects the deal to be closed within the "next five business days."

For more on Nokia's acquisition:
- check out this Guardian article

Nokia to buy all of Symbian

Paul Mah — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 06:33:24 -0400

Nokia has announced that it will offer to acquire the remaining 52 percent of Symbian Limited. Control of Symbian Limited, a software company formed to develop and license the Symbian OS, effectively gives Nokia sole control of the market-leading operating system for mobile devices.

Already, irrevocable undertakings have been secured from most of the other key owners--representing 91 percent of non-Nokia shares. Post-acquisition, Nokia intends to establish the Symbian Foundation, which will be instrumental to move the Symbian platform to open source over the next two years. You can read the press release announcing the Symbian Foundation here (pdf).

For more on Nokia's Symbian acquisition:
- check out this MobileMonday blog