Nokia: No Android phones for us
Mon Jul 6, 2009 11:35AM EDT
See Comments (2)
The Finnish phone giant says it's sticking with Symbian, and flatly denies a recent report that it has an Android-based smartphone in the works.
The Guardian posted a story early Monday claiming that Nokia, long a champion of the Symbian operating system (which currently powers Nokia's just-released N97 flagship smartphone, among many other handsets), was set to take a "strategic U-turn" by launching an Android phone in September.
Android is, of course, the Google-developed mobile OS that underpins such iPhone competitors as the T-Mobile G1, the HTC Magic in Europe and Canada, and the upcoming T-Mobile myTouch 3G.
Nokia officials wasted no time in slamming the Guardian story, telling Reuters in no uncertain terms that there is "absolutely no truth to this whatsoever," and that "everyone knows that Symbian is our preferred platform for advanced mobile devices."
And as All Things Digital points out, cozying up to Android would be a singularly odd thing for Nokia to do, given that it recently completed a $400-million acquisition of Symbian, setting it up as an open-source competitor to Android and the iPhone OS.
Personally, I seriously doubt that Nokia would ever go the Android way … but would I welcome the idea of a Nokia-built Android phone? You bet.
I've been playing around with the new, Symbian-powered N97 for about a week now, and I'm sorry, but Symbian is sure looking long in the tooth. Compared to the likes of the iPhone, WebOS on the Palm Pre, or the new Android-powered HTC Hero, the N97's Symbian interface feels outdated and clunky, even with its touch-enabled homescreen widgets.
I love the hardware on Nokia's phones—the N97's 5-megapixel camera spanks the 3.2MP model on the new iPhone 3GS, for example—but the Symbian OS needs a major overhaul to compete with the latest touchscreen smartphones, especially here in the U.S. (where Symbian has yet to gain a serious foothold.)
Anyway, that's my take. What do you think: Would you like to see an Android-powered Nokia phone?
Related:
Nokia denies plans phone running Google's Android [Reuters]
Top 5 Posts
- AT&T sees red over Verizon's "There's a map for that" ads
- AT&T's hissy fit over Verizon's "There's a map for that" ads continues
- T-Mobile mops up after another embarrassing outage
- The Motorola Droid or the iPhone: Which one's right for you?
- Verizon cries foul over Sprint's "most dependable network" ads
More About Cell Phones
Comments on Nokia: No Android phones for us
Post a Comment
Join in the discussion. Here you'll see the comments in the order they were posted.
-
2 Posted by magpagbst on Mon Jul 6, 2009 11:33PM EDT Report Abuse
yeah . . . nokia seems to be quite indifferent toward the american market . . . as evidenced by their strict adherence to there own, somewhat limited, os . . . and their reluctance to allow their best phones to be contracted with u.s. carriers . . . not many were rushing to buy the n95 for 700 bucks when they could get an iphone for 300 . . .
Sponsored Links
My Tech
Please enable your browser's cookies to activate the My Tech column.
Also on Yahoo! Tech
| Computers | Home Office | Wi-Fi & Networking | Phones & PDAs | Cameras & Camcorders | TV & Home Theater | Portable Audio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 Posted by webchetan on Mon Jul 6, 2009 3:20PM EDT Report Abuse
Nokia phones and OS are way behind as compared to awesome BlackBerry's, iPhones OS and Android OS. In short Nokia OS sucks big time!