Nokia's Lumia 900 will arrive in the United States in March, according to a Nokia Developer Website. Nokia is betting heavily on Windows Phone to shore up its market share.
Nokia's
high-end Lumia 900 smartphone will appear in the United States in March,
according to a newsletter posted on the Nokia
Developer Website.
"It
will become available exclusively through AT&T in March," read the
newsletter. "With support for AT&T's 4G LTE (Long-Term Evolution)
network, the Nokia Lumia 900 smartphone will offer high-performance web
browsing with Microsoft Internet Explorer Mobile, as well as both video and
audio streaming."
Previously,
Nokia and Microsoft were only willing to say the Lumia 900 would appear at some
point within
the next few months.
The
smartphones features a 4.3-inch active-matrix organic LED (AMOLED) display
(with 800-by-400 resolution) and a 1.4GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. It
runs Windows Phone Mango, the latest version of Microsoft's smartphone
software.
Nokia
is making a huge bet with Windows Phone, having abandoned its previous
operating systems (including Symbian) in favor of Microsoft's offering. If that
bet pays off, the Finnish phone maker could reverse its eroding global market
share. But Nokia isn't relying solely on a single high-end device to accomplish
that end; in addition to the Lumia 900, it's also offering the similar Lumia
800 in international markets, as well as the midmarket Lumia 710.
Shortly
after Nokia unveiled the Lumia 900 in conjunction with this month's Consumer
Electronics Show in Las Vegas, analysts leapt to judge its market prospects.
"This
device signals several things: firstly, that Nokia's serious about the U.S.,
launching arguably the flagship Lumia device in the U.S. before the rest of the
world," Jan Dawson, an analyst for research and consulting firm Ovum, wrote
in a Jan. 9 statement. "Secondly, that Nokia has the clout with Windows
Phone to allow it to be first to market with an LTE device; and thirdly, that
AT&T is now seriously into the business of offering LTE phones."
In
addition to the Lumia 900, CES also saw the introduction of the HTC Titan II, a
4G LTE-capable device also due at some point on AT&T. Despite some strong
reviews in the year-plus since its initial release, Windows Phone has thus far
failed to attract the sort of user base that would allow it to compete
toe-to-toe against competitors such as Apple's iPhone and the ever-growing
family of Google Android devices. However, with a recent software revamp and a
host of new devices from hardware partners such as Nokia and HTC, Microsoft is
hoping to change that.
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Nicholas Kolakowski is a staff editor at eWEEK, covering Microsoft and other companies in the enterprise space, as well as evolving technology such as tablet PCs. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, Playboy, WebMD, AARP the Magazine, AutoWeek, Washington City Paper, Trader Monthly, and Private Air. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
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