Barcelona, Spain – Nokia World 2008, the annual event of the Finnish mobile phone manufacturer, on Tuesday saw its top officials urging the mobile-consuming industry to envisage possibilities that are limited only by one’s imagination.
“Imagine a world where we can always connect to our friends and loved ones, where we can know what they are doing, where they are and how they are feeling. Imagine a world where we can know what is going on around us, around the corner and even around the world. Nokia is transforming the way we connect,” said Mark Selby, Vice President-Industry Liaison and Collaborations Nokia, welcoming guests here on the first day of the event where more than 3,000 participants attended.
President and CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo in his keynote speech said that more than 75 % of the world’s population still hasn’t used e-mail. “For many their first experience will be e-mail on our mobile,” he said.
He also noted that there will be about four billion people (out of the 6.5 billion) who will be using mobiles by the first quarter of next year. “This is about 60 % of the world population,” he added. He also said that Nokia, with more than one billion customers globally, has the opportunity to put the power of the Internet into the hands of more people in more places than any other company, and the features and the functionality of the N97 (a new product) will be passed onto the bottom of the price tier as well so that they are affordable to customers in the emerging markets as well, which will be how there will be this 60 % penetration.
Introducing the Nokia N97 which is designed to make the Internet personal, Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President Markets noted that with integrated A-GPS sensors and an electronic compass, this device intuitively understands where it is. “The Nokia N97 makes it easy to update social networks automatically with real-time information, giving people the ability to update their ‘status’ and share their location as well as related pictures or videos with approved friends.”
He also said that this will have maps on Ovi, a software that has the first free service allowing people to pre-plan their journey at home on their PC and synchronize with their mobile, giving access to pre-planned routes and favourite destinations while on the move.
“Over the coming months, Nokia Maps will become a destination for people to save and organize places, pre-plan trips and post-edit them. People can share their location and all their personally and socially meaningful content with friends, inviting them to join in activities. Mail on Ovi, together with Nokia Messaging which mobilizes consumer email and instant messaging on Nokia devices, brings mobile email to everyone and not just for a privileged few,” he explained, adding that the users will be able to create and access email online portal as well as on their mobile device.
“Nokia Messaging, on the other hand, will give consumers access to their existing email and instant messaging accounts from Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger, Windows Live Hotmail, Gmail and Google,” he said. He noted that this is the first step to transforming the Internet. “It will be putting in your hands the power to be more in tune with the world around you.”
Mobile mapping to be the next generation
Barcelona, Spain - Nokia released the latest version of its mobile mapping and navigation service, Nokia Maps, together with its personalised online mapping experience on Ovi (a single platform to support Nokia’s Internet services) at its annual event Nokia World 2008 here this week.
“This combination of Nokia Maps plus Ovi is the first free service that allows people to pre-plan their journey at home on their PC and synchronize with their mobile, giving access to pre-planned routes and favorite destinations while on the move,” Howard Hughes Vice President NAVTEQ (map makers) told a gathering at the event.
He noted that there is a major role for the wireless industry in easing road traffic. “Traffic services are demanded by consumers, businesses and governments. The traffic is primarily created due to the increase in the growth rate in cars relative to the growth in supportive infrastructure, which is causing traffic,” he said.
In addition, Nokia Maps has been updated to include a number of new features such as high-resolution aerial images, 3D landmarks for 216 cities and terrain maps, as well as a new route overview during routing and during drive, the purchasable turn-by-turn car navigation guidance.
Mr Hughes said that maps on Ovi are becoming more than just a mapping tool. “Over the coming months, Maps will become a destination for people to save and organize places, pre-plan trips and post-edit them. People can share their location and all their personally and socially meaningful content with friends, inviting them to join in activities and share experiences,” he said, adding that the level of detail in the maps has increased to the point that you can view multiple entrances to the same underground metro station. |
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