Nokia has revealed the first details of its response to the hugely successful iPhone, code named Tube. How the pre-launch hype is managed from here on will likely be as important as what Tube has to offer.
It must have been galling over the past two years for Nokia - the world's leading cellphone maker with a 40 percent market share - to watch the iPhone gather enormous momentum, without Apple having to raise finger.
First there was the amount of free publicity Apple garnered in the months leading up to the launch of the iPhone in January 2007 as the Internet buzzed with speculation about the existence of the product, the form it would likely take and the expected launch date.
Then when the phone finally appeared Nokia had to watch as the buzz continued unabated and the iPhone became not only the centre of attention for its features but for its flaws: its hackability enabling it to be used on networks other than that of AT&T which had, initially, the exclusive rights to the product.
Now, it has to watch while the pundits pour praise on the product, claiming that it has no equal in market. Take for example these comments from Ovum analyst Jan Dawson written in the aftermath of the big US mobile show CTIA Wireless 2008 - an event second only in size and significance to the GSM World Congress in Barcelona.
"It's been interesting to see the shadow the iPhone casts over everything even though Apple isn't visibly present at the show," Dawson wrote. "Sprint's big announcement was around the Samsung Instinct, which is a clear iPhone competitor. But the devices on display at Sprint's launch event were running beta software which was glitchy and slow, and it was clear that - though they have some nifty features - these devices are not a match for the iPhone ... The LG Vu...is another poor match for the device on everyone's minds."
Dawson concluded: "Of all the things that people love about the iPhone - the design, the UI, the browser, the ease of use - none of them were matched by most of the devices on display at CTIA, even though the manufacturers of those devices have been making phones for far longer than Apple. The Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 showed the most promise of any device I saw at CTIA, but it won't be launched for several months." Nokia didn't even rate a mention!
As sure as night follows day the Finnish giant will be planning a response, and it has started dropping the first hints. The device has been code named Tube and Tom Libretto, vice president of Forum Nokia, was giving out the first teasers at a recent Evans Data developer conference in the US.
Speaking to Reuters just before the launch of the new iPhone, at almost half the price of the first model, Anssi Vanjoki said that Nokia would unveil touchscreen products for all of the handset price segments, rather than just for the higher-end, where its rivals' handsets with touch screens are. "Currently, the market for touchscreen products is a niche market. We always aim for a situation where we can cover all the segments with all the options," he said.
Nokia gave a preview of the product, code named ‘Tube’ in April, generating a flurry of speculation similar but on a much smaller scale than that which preceded both the first and second versions of the iPhone. That initial flurry died down soon after the announcement and this week’s revelations could be an attempt by Nokia to try and stimulate some prelaunch publicity for the product.
Also this week the author of a Nokia Nseries discussion blog posted photos, sourced from Flickr, of a device claimed to be the Nokia 5800 Tube, saying: “it sports a large touch screen which can be used with a finger or stylus, and a 3.2 megapixel (Carl Zeiss Optics) camera with dual LED flash.”
In all likelihood any Nokia touch screen phones will use the Symbian S60 platform on which many Nokia phones are based. A touch screen version was announced in October 2007 . According to the Allaboutsymbian.com website, the touch interface will support both finger and stylus input, has full multi ingual support, has support for tactile feedback (haptics) and is backwardly compatible with the existing S60 platform.
Features identified at the time as giving it an advantage over the first iPhone included: its ability to support qwerty keypad, stylus, or touch screen input, tactile feedback and a web browser integrated with flash video.
Also many manufacturers are licensed to use S60 so there could be a very wide choice of touch screen S60 handsets available. There are claimed to be 100 million S60 devices sold, and thousands of registered S60 applications developers.
When it previewed Tube in April Nokia dismissed the threat posted by the first iPhone saying that it shipped more phones in weekend than iPhone’s, speculated, total sales. The new 3G iPhone with more features, a much lower prices an much wider availability will be a different kettle of fish entirely.
i wish a phone of of the iphone caliber was available on the tmobile network, the only phone we have worth owning is the Dash. im not a fan of the Blackberry models and the Wing sucked. ive never looked into picking up an unlocked iphone to use on my network mainly because i fear feature compatibility issues and the prices of buying a phone outright are just outrageous. if i cant 'upgrade' into a phone, i cant have it.
I would guess that if any US network is going to pick it up it would be T-Mobile. AT&T already sells the iphone and they are the only two US carriers that carry N series Nokia phones.
By the way you know you can get any unlocked phone and use it with your t-mobile account.
I'm stuck the same way in Verizon-only phones... it'd be nice to have a cool phone, but Verizon is the best carrier around here in terms of real service with very few dropped calls.
That thing is FAT!!!!!!!!!! No seriously, it's like twice as thick!
Kind of looks like a Zune, too.
That video is an example of the interface ignore the phone it is on. That is not the tube. I will say the camera will force it to be a little thicker then the iphone but not much.
The problem is, I always see these new things come out... "Oh this'll ruin the [such and such]" and it never happens. More specifically, I see it happen all the time with Apple Products. The Apple products are the first ones to revolutionize the specific market and then companies and their fan base come up with stuff like "iPhone Killer", "Better than the iPhone", etc. Honestly? Who cares? If it weren't for the iPhones, the MacBook Airs, the iMacs, the iPod, (the list goes on) the majority of these things would not exist or would not even be close to existing at this time.
Whether or not you support Apple and/or their products themselves, you have to thank them for pushing the envelope further for EVERYONE else to get the technology to where it is today...
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I will say that's a pretty nice looking interface, but companies need to start being honest with themselves. There is going to be an "iPhone Killer" as much as their was an "iPod Killer" (Zune anyone... anyone?). It's simply not going to happen because Apple's design and interface is year's ahead of the competition.
I respect the need to compete, but nokia, as well as others, are playing catch up like they were Heinz.
Well I kinda look at it this way... Apple has a strong showing in the US so what... That isn't where the market is Nokia controls 40% of the cell phone market world wide. iphone is a blip in the market. Nokia sells more phones every weekend then the iphone has sold in total. Nokia has 1 billion cell phones in active use. Yes, Nokia realizes that the current fad is touch screens and are working on meeting that fad. However, the iphone is a techy toy not a common person device. Most people will never take advantage of all its features.
I'll even throw one additional item out there. Until carriers roll data plans into the fold esp in the US these devices will always just be techy toys. Nokia is betting it will happen hence the reason I'm employed there. We are building a MobileMe on steroids, our site for example fully interrogated with the camera so you can upload your pictures directly to the net. Either publicly or private and we have been geo tagging them and mapping the location with the built in GPS since Feb. So who is copying who. The consumer electronics industry does this all the time.
Apple is a cool company the reason I own there stock. However, they do just as much copying as the next guy. Yes sometimes the have even a better presentation, sometimes not.
I'm stuck the same way in Verizon-only phones... it'd be nice to have a cool phone, but Verizon is the best carrier around here in terms of real service with very few dropped calls.
Yeah, I am sticking with Verizon also. Now that the Palm Centro is available on Verizon, you may want to check that one out. It is hard to beat the price. $99 after rebate and qualifying plan. It is not nearly as sexy as the Iphone, but it has touch screen and quite a few features for the money.
Well I kinda look at it this way... Apple has a strong showing in the US so what... That isn't where the market is Nokia controls 40% of the cell phone market world wide. iphone is a blip in the market. Nokia sells more phones every weekend then the iphone has sold in total. Nokia has 1 billion cell phones in active use. Yes, Nokia realizes that the current fad is touch screens and are working on meeting that fad. However, the iphone is a techy toy not a common person device. Most people will never take advantage of all its features.
I'll even throw one additional item out there. Until carriers roll data plans into the fold esp in the US these devices will always just be techy toys. Nokia is betting it will happen hence the reason I'm employed there. We are building a MobileMe on steroids, our site for example fully interrogated with the camera so you can upload your pictures directly to the net. Either publicly or private and we have been geo tagging them and mapping the location with the built in GPS since Feb. So who is copying who. The consumer electronics industry does this all the time.
Apple is a cool company the reason I own there stock. However, they do just as much copying as the next guy. Yes sometimes the have even a better presentation, sometimes not.
i screwed up today and took my nokia express music and took it swimming... they need to hurry up a badass phone, i dont want to use my old razor for to long
Whether or not you support Apple and/or their products themselves, you have to thank them for pushing the envelope further for EVERYONE else to get the technology to where it is today...
This is true. Apple could even do the same and copy some of those Zune features for there Itunes/Ipod
