Nokia is spearheading a new breed of its Ovi Applications Store in a hope of creating a one-stop digital application bazaar and supporting its own multimedia devices.
The Finnish world market leader in handsets hopes the online media and software hub will be a boon for itself as well as consumers, content developers and operators.
The move is a direct response to Apple's App Store for the iPhone, and is expected to spur a rapid evolution in the way people use mobile phones. The policy also reflects how the focus of the mobile-phone industry has shifted from devices to software and services.
While Nokia will certainly face an uphill struggle in creating a next wave of its own mobile applications and services in competition with the Apple App Store,it is also taking up another challenge by introducing its spin on the laptop, called the Booklet 3G.
The 10.1-inch HD-display mini laptop is priced at 575(28,500 baht), weighs one kilogramme and has a battery life of up to 12 hours.
At the recent Nokia World 2009 in Stuttgart, Nokia announced a wide range of novelties including a Beta version of Ovi Maps for S605th Edition phones,the Ovi Lifecasting feature and Social Messaging Beta for Nokia Messaging.
Ovi Maps gives users one-touch access to a variety of new content and services through maps.ovi.com. The new personalised services integrate the user's location and surroundings.
An extension of Nokia Messaging called Social Messaging Beta, which can run on the N97 and Nokia 6700 classic,will enable users to tap into multicommunity social networking to share status updates and photos from the camera or gallery and share current locations or view friends' locations. Ovi Lifecasting enables users to share their locations with their Facebook friends.
Ovi Store offers 4,500 applications including games, videos, widgets,location-based applications and personalised content under the Social Location (SoLo) concept. It allows users to download free and paid content and applications. Nokia also officially announced a lineup of new smartphones - the N900 and N97 Mini priced at 450- and the music phones Nokia X6 priced at 450 and X3 priced at 115.
CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said Nokia expected 300 million Ovi subscribers by 2012, up from 55 million across 100 Nokia devices in 180 countries currently."Nokia Ovi was an incredible success, with up to 1 million accounts activated in the past six months," he said.
"This economy of scale through web technology will level the playing field for Nokia, create 'ecosystems', and make Ovi Store a very compelling channel for developers and content publishers to enhance their service offering. It is critical for Nokia's future."
Up to 1.1 billion people use Nokia phones out of 4 billion mobile-phone users globally. In comparison, about 1.6 billion people have bank accounts and 1 billion use credit cards.
The Ovi Store is set to change the whole new digital application platform and spark a rapid evolution in the mobile industry, said Mr Kallasvuo.
Nokia plans to develop more applications and services as well as compatible devices to accommodate downloading demand. It signalled the determination to catch up with Apple by hosting a global developer competition called Calling All Innovators at its Forum Nokia 2009 in Stuttgart. More than 1,700 submissions were received from developers and publishers in 85 countries.
Categories include web applications and runtime widgets, Adobe Flash Litebased applications, emerging-market services and location-aware services utilising Ovi Maps.
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