LONDON: Nokia, the world’s largest cellphone maker, has unveiled three new smartphone models, trying to claw back market share at the lucrative top end of the sector.
The new models — E7, C7 and a new version of the C6 — all come with large touchscreens and use the latest Symbian software. They were unveiled in London.
Nokia C6 comes with a new display technology known as ClearBlack Display (CBD). CBD is said to offer improved outdoor visibility. The display gives users another choice when choosing between Super-LCD, AMOLED and Apple’s Retina Display. The smartphone has an 8 MP camera, supports WebTV and has free Ovi Maps.
Nokia C7 is a lighter, thinner version of the C6. The smartphone offers largely all the same features as C6. Both the smartphones have a 3.5-inch screen and 8GB of onboard storage. C7 is expected to be priced at approximately 335 euros. While Nokia C6 is expected to be available for 260 euros.
Nokia E7 is a business smartphone boasting of a 4 inch touchscreen CBD display and a slide-out four-row keyboard. E7 comes with an 8 megapixel camera and 16GB of on-board storage. The smartphone is able to shoot and edit 720p video and offers18 days of standby time and up to 9 hours of talktime.
Business features of E7 include support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, Mail for Exchange, Microsoft Communicator Mobile and Microsoft Share Point Server.
Nokia E7 is likely to be priced at 495 euros.
Nokia still controls around 40 percent of the global smartphone market volume, but has lost out to Apple and Research in Motion’s Blackberry in the fatter-margin market for the most expensive cellphone models.
“The products are a clear improvement from the N97 but we know they are not where Nokia needs to be yet, and any other promise around ‘we are working on it’ would have not convinced anyone,” said Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi. “A new CEO and the old guard stepping down might give investors more confidence that things are really changing.”
Nokia is in the middle of a major management revamp, with the departures of its chief executive and chairman announced last week and its top internal candidate for the CEO post resigning on Monday.
Last week, Nokia announced it was hiring Stephen Elop, a Microsoft executive with Silicon Valley credentials, to replace embattled chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo and renew its drive to compete with Apple.
On Monday, Nokia’s smartphone and services chief Anssi Vanjoki — an outspoken and respected figure in the mobile phone industry who had been considered the most likely internal candidate to replace Kallasvuo — announced his resignation.
Underlining the scale of the change, chairman Jorma Ollila, who led Nokia’s transformation from a rubber boots-to-TVs conglomerate into a mobile phones giant in the 1990s, said last week he would step down shortly.