Grainy images
of an unidentified Nokia tablet are have surfaced on the Internet. According to My Nokia Blog,
the device appears to be running MeeGo, the operating system that Nokia announced it was developing with Intel
nearly a year ago, at the 2010 Mobile World Congress. More contested is whether
the device is a prototype for a coming-to-market iPad competitor or just a
development device that the Nokia and Intel teams are using among themselves.
The images
capture the device in video-player mode, which reveals little. An airplane
image in the screen’s top left corner, as SlashGear points out, suggests it’s in airplane
mode—implying that integrated WiFi and Bluetooth are likely on board, in
addition to a flavor of 3G/UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System) connectivity.
In October, Doug
Fisher, vice president of Intel’s Software and Solutions Group, told Forbes
that Intel and Nokia were pleased with the pace of MeeGo’s development and that
smartphones and tablets running the operating system would arrive in the first
half of 2011. An exception is the WeTab, a Flash-supporting tablet with an
11.6-inch display and a 1.66GHz Intel Atom “Pineview” processor.
Over at Nokia,
lips are sealed about the company’s plans for the 2011 Mobile World Congress,
kicking off Feb. 14 in Barcelona, but the WeTab will be on display at the show, along with
other MeeGo and Intel Atom–running devices.
Intel and
Nokia—an interesting matchup—have each fumbled in the consumer mobile market.
At an Oct. 5, 2010, talk in New York, Intel CEO Paul Otellini admitted that the
company had been slow to recognize a growing opportunity. "I wish I had
been smart enough to start [working on smartphone processors] seven years ago
because we'd be in a good position today, but I wasn't," he said.
Nokia,
meanwhile—despite still being the top-selling phone maker worldwide—has had a
hard time competing against Apple and Google at the high-end of the U.S.
smartphone market.
“It is
well-publicized that we are working to regain leadership in the U.S. market,
and we are in active discussions with our operator partners on that strategy,” Laurie
Armstrong, Nokia communications director, told eWEEK Jan. 20, following rumors
that Nokia had called off an exclusive deal with AT&T,
fearing that its new X7 smartphone wouldn’t “receive enough marketing and
subsidies support” from the carrier, according to the Wall Street Journal.
That Nokia and
Intel should have a tablet on the way—possibly the photographed device—puts
them in the popular company of Nokia smartphone competitors Apple, Research In
Motion, Samsung, HTC and Motorola, to name just a few.
Research firm
IDC, in a Jan. 18 report, said it expects tablet sales to “accelerate
significantly” during the first quarter of this year before finishing with
shipments of 44.6 million units. In 2012, that figure is expected to climb to
nearly 71 million units.
Consulting firm
Deloitte, in a report released the same day, summed up the tablet craze by
calling 2011 a “tipping point” for sales of the devices, which are all chasing
the success of the Apple iPad. In the third quarter of 2010, Apple controlled
87.4 percent of the worldwide tablet market, according to IDC.
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