At the same time the company was announcing lowered expectations for cell phone sales, Nokia Corp. on Tuesday introduced a new bunch of jazzy handsets along with one that is actually geared toward the more conservative corporate customer.
In spite of the product onslaught, Nokia today lowered sales expectations for the first quarter, slightly below the 6 to 10 percent decline that the company had already predicted. While the phone sales are expected to be in the range of 3 to 7 percent less than the same time last year, network sales are expected to drop by 25 percent.
The new phones from the Espoo, Finland, company include:
- The Nokia 6310i — a “classic category” phone whose bells and whistles are of the practical sort. It supports GSM 900, 1800 and 1900 networks, meaning it can operate on five continents. It also enables downloads of Java applications over the Web.
- Two new phones in the companys vaguely named “expression category,” both which will benefit from a new partnership with LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC, wherein the company will work with Nokia to create Star Wars applications and ring tones for the phones. The 3410, for European and African markets, features support for Java 2 Micro Edition, a 3-D graphics engine and a picture editor for creating illustrated messages. The 3510, for the European, African and Asia-Pacific markets, includes support for several multimedia features, including polyphonic ringtones and screen savers.
- The 3315, which falls into the companys “basic” category. It focuses on Short Message Service support, but also includes a picture editor as well as a Chinese phonebook.
- The 9210i Communicator, a luxury item that includes a Web browser that supports JavaScripts, a video player that supports Flash animation, and the RealOne player from RealNetworks Inc. that supports real-time video and audio streaming. Nokia also announced on Monday that the RealOne player will be a standard feature on all upcoming devices that run on the Symbian operating system.
- The 7210, a member of Nokias “fashion” category, which features a screen that supports 4,096 colors, tri-band GSM support and an FM radio. The 7210 is due in the third quarter of this year, while the others are due in the second quarter.