Nokia is officially back!
After making their fans and followers wait for months, the Finnish multinational communications and information technology company is now back at the mobile market with the release of their first ever Android-powered smartphone – the Nokia 6.
HMD Global, the Finnish firm that owns the rights to use Nokia’s brand on smartphones, unveiled the Nokia 6 in China through JD.COM (Jingdong Mall) last January 19 at exactly 10 am.
The pre-registrations reached over a million ahead of the on sale date and within a minute, all units are sold.
Their decision to launch the newest Nokia phone only in China (for now) reflects the desire of the brand to meet the needs of consumers in different markets around the globe.
According to statistics, China has 552 million smartphone users in 2016 and it’s predicted to reach more than 590 million this year.
The Nokia 6 is powered by 1.1GHz octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 processor.
It has 4 GB of internal memory and 64 GB of on-board storage and its microSD slot can support up to 256 GB.
It has a 16 megapixel primary camera and 8 MP for its secondary that is quite good for selfies.
Camera features includes geo-tagging, touch focus, face detection, panorama and HDR.
It uses a non-removable Li-Ion 3000 mAh battery.
The Nokia 6 has dual SIM (GSM + CDMA and GSM + CDMA) capability and connectivity options include Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth, USB OTG, FM, 3G and 4G.
It also has compass magnetometer, proximity sensor, accelerometer, ambient light sensor, gyroscope and finger print detector.
Its physical design might look so simple but it represents the modern attribute of a smartphone with its IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen in 1920×1080 HD screen that measures 5.5 inches on the diagonal.
Since it was first launched in China, Nokia 6 doesn’t have any Google apps pre-installed even though it uses Google’s Nougat 7.0 Android operating system.
For Nokia fans outside China or for those people who just wanted to try and test their newest smartphone, you might have to wait until the end of February.
HMD said that they will introduce a series of Nokia smartphones this year and is planning a major announcement at the upcoming Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that will start on February 27 and will end on March 2, 2017.
A rumored Nokia P1 concept surface online
The Nokia P1, HMD Global’s flagship Android smartphone bearing the famous brand name, may be unveiled at MWC 2017. Today, a concept video on YouTube imagines how the Nokia P1 could look like.
The video shows Carl-Zeiss lens at the back, a home button with an embedded fingerprint scanner up front, and a metal chassis.
Of course this is just a concept render, the actual Nokia P1 phone may end up looking completely different.
The Nokia brand is hoping that this newest smartphone and their partnership with HMD can take them to the top of mobile market that they once enjoyed.
Nokia was the most popular mobile phone brand for more than a decade (1990s).
Watch history of Nokia:
The start of their downfall came when Blackberry phones enter into the scene. Then it was followed by Apple and Samsung who are now considered as smartphone kings.
They are picked up by Microsoft in 2014 and started selling smart phones under its own name, the Microsoft’s Nokia Lumia.
(via hmdglobal.com, forbes.com, nokia.com, gadgets.ndtv.com)
