AfterDawn: News

Nokia to start building Windows Phone 7 devices?

Although unconfirmed by either company, Eldar Murtazin is reporting this week that Nokia is in early talks with Microsoft to begin building smartphones run on Windows Phone 7.

The talks were started by Nokia management.



If true, the new Windows Phone devices will be sold "under the Nokia brand, via Nokia distribution channels" and will include some standard Nokia features.

Nokia has long run their smartphone on the Symbian platform, and recently launched Meego, in a partnership with Intel.

Meego is still in early stages, however.

For now this is rumor, by Murtazin is a very reputable source known for his insider sources in the mobile phone industry.

Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 20 Dec 2010 13:52

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• 4 comments

• xyqo

  This has got to be a joke.
  Even if it were true it would be a lot smarter and a whole lot cheaper for Nokia to use android if they want to outsource for an OS

  20.12.2010 14:32 #1

• pet2008

  Originally posted by xyqo: This has got to be a joke.
  Even if it were true it would be a lot smarter and a whole lot cheaper for Nokia to use android if they want to outsource for an OS Maybe not! Nokia will have to differentiate themselves and create some Sense interface like HTC which costs money, not if they chose WP7. Do you know that every android sold pays patent money to Microsoft? at least for all HTC units. Windows Phone 7 if you haven't used it is in a completely different level to Android. Android has more features but suffers from fragmentation, slowness, inconsistent interface and maintaining updates which is an extra expense, plus poor battery life and task managers. Windows phone 7 will get all the features of android in the next 6-10 months, plus the OS is by inception better than android. So makes sense for Nokia to use the best OS out there (iphone out of the question) and also play it cosy with the business world and also get a stronghold in USA and China where the old Windows mobile is second only to Symbian. I am sure chinese will be happy to use microsoft and not google for the known hacking reasons etc.
  

  20.12.2010 19:23 #2

• xyqo

  Originally posted by pet2008: Originally posted by xyqo: This has got to be a joke.
  Even if it were true it would be a lot smarter and a whole lot cheaper for Nokia to use android if they want to outsource for an OS Maybe not! Nokia will have to differentiate themselves and create some Sense interface like HTC which costs money, not if they chose WP7. Do you know that every android sold pays patent money to Microsoft? at least for all HTC units. Windows Phone 7 if you haven't used it is in a completely different level to Android. Android has more features but suffers from fragmentation, slowness, inconsistent interface and maintaining updates which is an extra expense, plus poor battery life and task managers. Windows phone 7 will get all the features of android in the next 6-10 months, plus the OS is by inception better than android. So makes sense for Nokia to use the best OS out there (iphone out of the question) and also play it cosy with the business world and also get a stronghold in USA and China where the old Windows mobile is second only to Symbian. I am sure chinese will be happy to use microsoft and not google for the known hacking reasons etc. Quote:
  If true, the new Windows Phone devices will be sold "under the Nokia brand, via Nokia distribution channels" and will include some standard Nokia features. They'll still have to do some custom work. The only difference is that they'll have to beg and grovel to Microsoft for them to open up their air tight platform. So the cost of a custom UI would still be required. Besides Nokia would be wise not to mess with it too much considering how outdated their symbian UI is.
  You spoke about fragmentation. Well consider this. What happens when Meego is ready for prime time? They'll have legacy devices running Symbian millions at that and they'll also have Winmo and Meego.
  Don't worry about China they'll catch up they always do. I think the Nokia brand is more important there than the platform that brand uses.
  As for royalties who collects more mobile tech royalties than Nokia? I'm sure they could work something out there too.
  
  I'm not an andriod fanboy just a logical guy I'm actually a bb user. It just makes more sense to go with whats popular well supported works well and is cheap. They wouldn't even need to go through Google and use the android market they could have an android OVI store. Think about it...
  

  XXYYQQOO!!! Yeah WELCOME TO JAMROCK
  
  

  20.12.2010 20:08 #3

• dali

  It's been quite a while since the last time on which I understood a move from Nokia. When the most difficult work with Symbian was done already (OS made Open Source, improved UI with multitouch and social capabilities, and so on), they stopped to support their recently developed Maemo, but only in behalf of MeeGo, which is, if I'm right, the result of merging Maemo with Moblin, and their presumed choice of flagship platform since then.
  
  Given this scenario, every other brand just started to quit Symbian one by one and let it die, when it was still the market leader by far, had overcome its worst flaws, featured apps for almost everything, and was made a HIGHLY EXPERIENCED, OPTIMIZED, EVOLVED and open platform. (Yes, I know that the most of you afterdawners won't agree with me on this matter, but it's my humble opinion anyway).
  
  That made no sense for me, neither do the contents of this article. So, it's likely to be true, surprising or not. Such an alliance would be a killer, though, but what about the huge amount of time wasted on other alternatives during the last years? Will Microsoft pay enough for it?
  

  Things change. People dont.

  21.12.2010 06:55 #4