Nokia (NYSE: NOK) was all proud to announce that its Nokia Life Tools pilot was a success. Launched in December 2008 in Maharashtra, India — with services in Agriculture, Learn English, General Knowledge and Astrology — the program offered buyers of the Nokia 2600 classic or the Nokia 1680 classic the option to purchase subscriptions to the Nokia Life Tools services that were most relevant to them.
Users of the Agriculture Service described that they were better informed about market rates for their produce, giving them newfound confidence in their negotiations with the agents. Moreover, there was also resounding appreciation for the time and money saved from not having to make multiple trips to the marketplace to get the latest rates.
On a similar note, farmers said that they’ve benefited from having advanced information about weather, news and crop advisory services – to plan labour, sowing, harvesting and selling better, and with more predictable results.
As for two other services — Learn English and General Knowledge — subscribers all claimed “confidence and empowerment as key motivators and benefits for the services.”
Nokia Life Tools will launch commercially India-wide in the first half of 2009. The service will be enabled in the upcoming Nokia 2320 and Nokia 2323, and on more devices to be announced later in the year.
Telefonica and Nokia (NYSE: NOK) have signed a strategic agreement to bring educational content to remote schools in Latin America using mobile technology. The agreement goes in line with Telefonica (NYSE: TEF) Foundation’s “Proniño” and “Educared” social programs, as well as Nokia’s ongoing work to harness the power of mobile technology for social development.
The first implementation is planned for Chile, where the two companies will enable isolated schools to have access to high quality educational content, including innovative resources, tools and services for students, fathers and teachers via Educared. The agreement will be later expanded to other countries in Latin America and will prioritize schools where Proniño works.
The agreement will also extend to the adoption of Nokia Data Gathering software by Telefonica Foundation within its Proniño program, and the companies will also be working with local governments in the use of information technologies.
Commenting on the announcement, Nokia’s CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, saud: “This partnership demonstrates the significant social benefits that mobile technology can deliver, reaching communities and children who previously had very limited educational opportunity in an inspiring and accessible way.”
Yesterday, many blogs reported that Nokia (NYSE: NOK) has sold 13 million 5800 XpressMusic devices. Apparently, they picked that number from Forum Nokia North America’s, who said that the number was reached in April this year. He meant to say the Nokia 5310 XpressMusic, instead – the device which is on the market since 2007.
Woke up to find a HUGE misquote. Exec said we shipped 13M 5800’s. He meant 13M Nokia 5310 XpressMusic. Please let folks know.
That’s more like it — otherwise, they would have numbers Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) would die for. This is not to say the Nokia 5800 XM is not a capable device, quite the contrary. Only that it was released few months ago and the 13 million mark seems incredible for any phone on the market…
Have I mentioned lately how much I love Nokia Beta Labs? Their latest experiment is called Easy Meet, which allows you to collaborate with peers on the web or mobile without needing to download any software whatsoever. You can set up the meeting right on your phone and shoot out invites via SMS or e-mail, and the meeting itself allows for both text, voice and graphics to be used. As cool as that all is, I think it’s astounding that no extra software is needed – is the web interface really that workable on mobile? You can do a lot with web apps on desktop computers, but this sounds very ambitious for mobile browsers. Here’s the full feature set as of release:
File Sharing, supporting PPT, JPEG and PNG
Chat
Meeting Minutes
Whiteboard
Gesturing
File Downloads
Participant Awareness
Remote Content Access (OVI Files).
One click to join a conference, including voice conference
Awesome stuff, all in all. Go to easymeet.nokia.com on either mobile or computer to give it a shot.
France Telecom acquired an additional 9.87% stake of the Senegal-based Sonatel, taking its ownership to 52.2%. Upon the completion of the transaction, the Senegalese government will remain Sonatel’s second biggest shareholder with 17.28% share.
Originally, France Telecom invested in the landline and mobile network operator in 1997, and has expanded since to Mali, Guinea and Guinea-Bissau. At the end of 2008, the group had 3.8 million customers in Senegal, and a further 3.4 million in surrounding countries.
Commenting on the announcement, France Telecom’s Executive Director of the AMEA region, Marc Rennard, said: “The quality of Sonatel’s teams combined with France Telecom’s experience have made Sonatel one of the most important operators in West Africa, especially in terms of innovation and service quality, which continue to benefit the Group’s customers across its footprint. This new stage in our partnership will strengthen the dynamic business performance that characterises the Sonatel Group.”
Remember that cool-looking Nokia Photo Browser for Symbian S60 touch-enabled devices like the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) 5800 XpressMusic we covered two weeks ago? Well, the Finnish giant’s Beta labs has updated the application and now it works on non-touch phones as well. Actually, only devices running Symbian S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1 and 2 are included in the mix, leaving owners of such phones as the Nokia N73, E61 and N93 empty handed.
There are actually two versions of the app available – one for S60 3.1 and S60 3.2 phones without accelerometer, and the other one for S60 3.2 phones with a built-in accelerometer. In the latter category are such phones as the Nokia N86, E75, 6720 Classic, 5730XM, E55, N79, N85, N96 and 6210 Navigator; and this version also works on the 5800 XM and the upcoming N97. The final stage — when Nokia Photo Browser leaves the beta stage — will involve a single installation file for all S60 variations. In the meantime, you’ll have to pick your version for yourself, which honestly is not a big deal.
Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and Telefónica announced an agreement under which the mobile operator will offer Nokia Messaging push email service to its users in Spain.
Those not familiar with Nokia Messaging should know the following (from the press release):
Nokia Messaging simplifies the mobilization of email. This new solution allows the easy access and use of multiple email accounts, by simplifying the process and removing complex steps. Push technology ensures the quick delivery of emails directly to the mobile phone. Nokia Messaging is compatible with thousands of Internet service providers (ISPs), like with terra.es and telefonica (NYSE: TEF).net. The service allows users to set-up, access and use personal inboxes in a quick and easy way. The service will be provided via a flat and affordable rate for Telefonica customers.
Commenting on the announcement, Nokia Iberia’s Marieta del Rivero said: “In Spain, there are more than 15 million active personal email accounts, so there is tremendous potential for the number of users that can leverage this service. The objective is to bring mobile email to the masses and make it accessible to the largest number of users possible.”
My comment – if the service roll-out goes as planned and people dig the idea, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the two companies start offering the service to other markets where Telefónica operates.
BGR has it on good authority from one of their ‘ninjas’ that Nokia (NYSE: NOK) is working hard to launch a rotating/swiveling QWERTY device on Verizon (NYSE: VZ) for July or August. Not very much is known at this point, other than the fact that the OS to come preloaded on the ‘Swiveler’ is S40… Boo-urns. The image above here is apparently a mockup created by the ‘ninja’ to give a basic impression of the device and form-factor. You can clearly see how the device would ’swivel’. Interesting stuff, but I’d love to see some more specs and shots of said device… if it is indeed coming. Till we hear more, I’m going to plop this one into the rumor category. Stay tuned for more.
Chinese handset makers cloners are getting faster with the day. Even though the Nokia N86 8MP has not been officially released, they’ve managed to clone it. The newly created device, called NCKIA N86E, is almost identical to Nokia (NYSE: NOK)’s original handset, although quite uglier.
Specs wise — in case you care to know — there’s a 2.6-inch QVGA touchscreen, some camera (I don’t think it’s 8 megapixel), FM radio, two SIM card slots, Bluetooth, media player, and of course a microSD memory card slot. Price is unknown, but really, spending $50 on this is wasting $49. The leather case that seems to come in the box of this device looks kinda cool to spend a buck on it.
And now some more images. Take a closer look, not to be fooled into buying this…
Daily Mobile has an interesting story, which unfortunately we can’t check at the moment. According to the Swedish website, Nokia (NYSE: NOK) is working on a smaller version of its all-touchscreen handset, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, that will be called Nokia 5530 XpressMusic.
And while there are no images at the moment to confirm this, Daily Mobile says the specs include 2.9-inch touchscreen, WiFi, 3.2 megapixel camera, Symbian S60 5th edition, standard 3.5mm audio jack, FM radio with RDS, 150MB of internal memory and of course a microSD memory card slot. GPS receiver is not on the list, and we’ve no information whether this is a 3G (HSDPA) enabled device, or not.
It’s not hard to imagine the logic behind a device such as the Nokia 5530 XpressMusic. It sounds like a winner designed to grab the attention of users in emerging markets. Without a 3G radio and GPS, it should be significantly cheaper than its older brother, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, yet providing decent functionality all round. We’ll see where this goes…
[Via: Unwired View, picture above is the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic]
Telefonica and Nokia (
