Earlier this month we wrote about a leaked Nokia handset called the Oro, and today it’s been made official. For 800 Euros, or more than $1100, you get the 7 month old C7 with 18-carat gold plating, a back made from Scottish leather, and a special home button made from sapphire. Oh and you also get a blinged out theme with gold tinted icons. It comes in white or black and it’ll be available in Q3 in Europe, Eastern Europe, China and the Middle East. Nokia is nice enough to throw the latest version of Symbian on this thing, Anna, but we’ve got to wonder, how thick do you have to be to buy this thing? The Finnish handset maker says “in some areas, possession of such premium products is the passport to being taken seriously,” which is another way of saying “if you live in a society where everyone is shallow enough to ignore you unless you have a stupid expensive mobile phone, then this is the handset for you!”.
We know Nokia has done devices like this in the past, most notably with their 8800 that was released in so many premium versions we lost count. Just because there’s a market for these type of handsets, does it mean that Nokia has to serve them? The team that made this thing probably comprised of only a handful of Nokia people, but we can’t help but think that they could have been put to better use than to come up with a heinous looking edition of a phone to make Saudi oil men happy.
Make no mistake about it, if Nokia actually made a 800 Euro handset by building it with premium components then it would sell to a much wider audience. Something that packed the best the industry has to offer. We’re waiting for such a device. The N95 was probably the closest thing to that, and it’s been half a decade.