DUBAI: The Nokia N97, billed as “the most advanced mobile computer to date,” will begin selling at the end of this month in more than 75 countries, including Saudi Arabia. Nokia hopes that the N97 will transform the way people connect to the Internet and to each other. Designed for the needs of Internet-savvy consumers, the Nokia N97 combines a large 3.5” touch display with a full QWERTY keyboard, providing an “always open” window to favorite social networking sites and Internet destinations. Nokia’s flagship Nseries device introduces leading technology — including multiple sensors, memory, processing power and connection speeds — for people to create a personal Internet and share their “social location.”
The home screen of the Nokia N97 mobile computer features the people, content and media that matter the most to each individual. Friends, social networks and news are available by simply touching the home screen. The 16:9 widescreen display can be fully personalized with frequently updated widgets of favorite web services and social networking sites. The Nokia N97 is also well suited to browsing the web, streaming Flash videos or playing games. The device includes both a physical QWERTY keyboard and virtual touch input to ensure efficiency in blogging, chatting, posting, sending texts or emailing.
“This is a very exciting time for us as we bring the ultimate device in mobile computing to the market,” said Chris Braam, VP, Sales, Nokia Middle East and Africa. “People may remember Nokia’s Communicator series, introduced in 1996. The phone was huge and heavy. It had just 8 MB total memory. Now if you look at where we are today with the N97, how it can be personalized — the speed of transformation is unparalleled. The second point to note is all about our numbers. The numbers are massive. Today there are 1.3 billion Internet users. Half a billion of them gaining access with a mobile device already. Today in overall market share globally, Nokia has 37 percent market share and over a billion users. However, it’s not a clear one on one in terms of Internet users because not all Nokia users are Internet users. These numbers present a compelling opportunity that we are working to execute against.”
And the N97 is a huge part of Nokia’s strategy to transform itself from a company that sells hardware to a company that enriches its bottom line as a global content and services provider. The N97 is the first Nseries device to feature a dedicated homescreen shortcut for the Ovi Store, which has now become globally available featuring thousands of applications, games, videos, podcasts, productivity tools, web and location-based services, and much more. Unfortunately for Nokia, in the Middle East, interest in the store is limited as there’s a serious lack of applications in Arabic. Additionally, Ovi hasn’t been localized to the Arabic language and there is no date yet announced for such functionality to become available.
To help overcome the deficiency in Arabic applications, Nokia has launched the “Bil3arabi” competition for local developers. The competition challenges mobile and web application developers to submit best-in-class Arabic applications and content for upload to the Ovi Store to use on Nokia devices. The competition began June 2 on www.callingallinnovators.com/Bil3arabi and content can be uploaded to Ovi Store until October 30 2009, with winners being announced by December 7, 2009.
“We are very proud to be introducing our developer competition focused on Arabic content,” said Braam. “The Middle East and Arabic speakers around the world represent a large and dynamic group of consumers, and we are seeking native Arabic developers to help us offer them what they want. With the Ovi Store now available, Nokia is offering developers a unique opportunity to publish content with 70 percent revenue share and world-wide distribution.”
The Bil3arabi developer competition for Arabic content is open to everyone, whether it is someone new to mobile or an experienced coder. Tools and help in learning about Nokia application development are available through www.forum.nokia.com. The company believes that the competition will offer new opportunities for local developers to grow their business as the intellectual property rights of the application will always remain with the developer. Mobile and web application developers can submit entries for Arabic content in any category within the Ovi Store — Applications and Widgets, Video, Personalization, Games, Audio, Flash and Active idle widgets. Nokia suggested that the most popular applications would probably be in areas of Internet Innovation, Flash and Mobile Games. All eligible entries received will be judged throughout the competition time period by Nokia, industry experts and promotion entities. Critically however, local consumers will play a role as Nokia will track the number of downloads of the application for one month after it is uploaded to the Ovi Store. Criteria for choosing the winner include quality and functionality; uniqueness and innovativeness; usability and creativity; and ability to fulfill users’ needs in terms of relevancy and customer adoption.
The Grand prize winner will receive $100,000 in cash, “spotlight” placement featuring the winning application for four weeks on the top page of Nokia’s Ovi Store and paid travel to demo the winning application at a Nokia specified event. The winning application will also be reviewed by Nokia for possible preload on future Nokia devices. Second place will receive $25,000 in cash; and “spotlight” placement featuring the winning application for three weeks on a relevant category page within Nokia’s Ovi Store. The remaining top ten submissions will be awarded the “Judge’s Choice Award,” which will give them a one-year membership in Forum Nokia Launchpad. This provides access to exclusive resources and support to accelerate mobile application development and elevate developer’s business visibility in the mobile world.
This is all great news for Ovi Store users but music lovers will still have a while to wait before a Saudi version of the Nokia Music store is launched. Braam stated that music rights clearance must take place on a market by market basis. Nokia has an online music store in the UAE and South Africa, and Saudi Arabia is on the company’s roadmap. But for now, pirated music downloads will still hold sway in the Kingdom as other options are very limited.
That’s a pity because the Nokia N97 is designed with great music features including 32 GB of on-board memory and a potential continuous playback time of up to 1.5 days. The Nokia N97 also has a 5-Megapixel camera with high-quality Carl Zeiss optics, 16:9 and DVD quality video capture, and support for services such as Share on Ovi for immediate sharing over HSDPA and WLAN.
The sharing concept brings up the next issue with the N97 — connectivity. In the Kingdom, mobile Internet connectivity isn’t affordable for many and isn’t available everywhere. An “always on” device such as the N97 only achieves full functionality when it has the ability to remain constantly connected to the Internet. Nokia also hasn’t overcome the issue concerning the use of a credit card to make purchases from the Ovi Store. Some applications on Ovi are free but others are purchased for a fee that varies depending on the developer. In some countries, Ovi purchases are billed through telecom providers, but in the Kingdom that is not yet possible.
One final issue regarding the N97 is its cost. The device is now available for preorder in Saudi Arabia at Nokia branded stores in Jeddah, Riyadh and Alkhobar for SR2997. That is equal to about $800, which appears to be standard across the European market. For the US market, the preorder launch price at online sites has already been reduced to $524 — down from $699. During the N97 launch event Braam stated that Saudis are well known as “tech leaders and tech stylists.” Perhaps the company believes the Kingdom’s consumers will lead with their wallets as well.
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