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October 26, 2011
Nokia unveiled the Lumia 800 and 710 handsets at its annual Nokia World event. The Lumia devices are the first Windows Phone devices launched by Nokia since the company announced its intention to use Windows Phone as its main smartphone operating system (OS) in February 2011
The Lumia 800 is positioned as the flagship model: it features a 3.7 inch AMOLED display, a 1.4 GHz processor, Carl Zeiss optics, and 16GB of internal memory. The estimated retail price for the Nokia Lumia 800 will be approximately 420 EUR, excluding taxes and subsidies. Its design is almost identical to the N9 MeeGo-running smartphone launched in select markets during the summer. The Lumia 800 will be available in the UK, France, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands in early November. Launches in the US and China are planned in the first half of 2012.
The Lumia 710 is a more affordable variant on the same hardware chassis, retailing for approximately €270, excluding taxes and subsidies. It will first launch in Hong Kong, India, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan before the end of the year.
Nokia also unveiled exclusive Windows Phone apps focused on navigation, music (a personal radio service similar to Pandora) and a sports hub (in partnership with ESPN).
The Windows Phone devices are part of a series of announcements, including a new line-up of lower cost handsets aimed at emerging markets, a range of audio accessories launched in partnership with Monster and new location-based services.
Nokia's comeback in smartphones will not be achieved overnight. Nokia will need to steadily release hardware that is able to differentiate sufficiently and convince operator partners to back them as heavily as iPhone or Android devices. The Microsoft partnership ensures a strong commitment for success since neither they nor Nokia can afford to be left out of the smartphone race. It will however mean less control from Nokia over the software stack and therefore requires permanent and efficient collaboration going forward.
The nature of this relationship raises questions on how other key Microsoft partners (HTC, Samsung and LG) will react and how much effort will be put into favoring Windows Phone over Android.
The first Lumia devices are a step in the right direction: the 800 has enough polish to compete with flagship offerings from Samsung and Apple, while the 710 is priced aggressively in the mid-tier segment currently dominated by Android handsets.
IHS Screen Digest expects Windows Phone shipments to pass 110m units in 2015, over 65 per cent of which will be Nokia-branded.
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Devices: Mobile smartphones forecast - 14 Dec 11
Devices: Mobile handset forecast - 14 Dec 11
