New Nokia Smartphones and Tablets Are Coming in Late 2016: Company Executive (pcworld.com)

An anonymous reader writes: The resurrection of the Nokia brand may happen in the fourth quarter of this year, which could make for some really nostalgic holiday gifts. According to Chinese site ThePaper (in Chinese), Nokia executive Mike Wang confirmed that three or four Nokia-branded Android devices are on the way for the fourth quarter of 2016. The comeback effort would include both phones and tablets. There is a chance, however, that the timeline could get pushed back depending upon how things progress. It wouldn't be a terrible shocker considering we're talking about a new company, HMD. It's composed of former employees from Microsoft, the old Nokia, and others who are banding together to resurrect the once-iconic brand. The best rumor we have is that the phones will have 5.2-inch and 5.5-inch Quad HD, OLED displays, a Snapdragon 820 SOC, 22.6MP back camera, and a metal build with water and dust resistance. No word on what a tablet would look like.

Comments

Just another "me too!"

[npslider]

In order for a new phone / tablet to stand out in the ever-growing crowd of smart devices it needs to be truly different. The rumored specs listed could be for any device!

Perhaps it will play the classic Nokia ring tone by default? That may turn a few heads.

Re:Just another "me too!"

[npslider]

Maybe not the camera.

The camera's mega-pixel count did sound high, but those numbers are nearly meaningless w/o the quality optics and image sensors to make those huge images actually look good.

But yeah, it's not going to be just random Chinese phone with Nokia brand? Like Blackberry does? Actual hardware from Nokia?

Will the place of origin matter to anyone comparison shopping? Will we even know?

Nothing but the name

[bdh]

People salivating over this should remember that Nokia has already released an Android; the N1. That was two years ago. Was it a good tablet? By all accounts, it was excellent. Did it make a massive effect on the market? It barely made a ripple, and was quickly forgotten. And this is a spinoff of that Nokia.

People who are expecting Nokia to come roaring back are going to be disappointed. I'd love to see some new of the old Nokia magic myself, but like Ashton-Tate, Borland, Sun Microsystems, and the like, their time has sadly passed. Nokia was exceptional at making quality feature phones, and some really smart stuff went into their smartphones (I had a 5800 and loved it), but their skills didn't map to the mass market smartphone market. Like Blackberry, they were still selling phones with some computer features, while the rest of the market was selling hand-held computers that happened to make phone calls.

Fortunately, they appear to be making tentative steps. Maybe they'll come out with some cool features and give Samsung some competition. I hope so, but I'm certainly not expecting them to become one of the big three phone/tablet vendors any time soon.

Re:Nothing but the name

[npslider]

The big players (Apple, Samsung, Nexus, etc) have already established themselves, and like all new market niches, competition eventually kills off the weaker ones. Nokia is too late to the party, the music is over and the lights are out.

I do hope they can buck that trend, but short of inventing a NEW kind of phone, what will they do to stand out. Smart phone shoppers already know the brand names in the race. Nokia, for some will bring back fond memories, for others... blank stares - "Noki- who?"

I believe I know

[93 Escort Wagon]

"No word on what a tablet would look like"

Usually they're rather thin, rectangular black slabs with a glass screen on the front and either a plastic or metallic back.

Re:What burned bridges?

[tripleevenfall]

More like

-Fin-

Please Nokia

[MightyMartian]

After using a Windows 10 mobile device (a tablet) for a few hours now, all I can say is holy shit, does Windows suck on touch devices. Christ almighty, even in "tablet" mode, it's just bloody awful. No wonder Microsoft's mobile plans are falling through, what a fucking disgrace. Even early versions of iOS and Android had a better user experience. Please Nokia, be done with Windows.

QWERTY

[short]

Nokia started the smartphone era with Nokia Communicators. They had QWERTY keyboards. With arrow keys, a numeric row, extra keys for launching applications (no touchscreen!). Where is the QWERTY?

Dockable Linux Phone

[rlp]

Way back in the prehistoric days of PDA, Nokia made a couple of awesome little Linux based PDA's. If they want to make something beyond the standard Android phone, they should do a Linux based phone that can also plug into a dock and function as a full desktop. Perhaps partner with Canonical using their software base.

Re:new bricks

[ChunderDownunder]

These aren't Lumias, they're Android-based.

I thought people only threw Windows through windows.

Leverage the name in 2nd/3rd world?

[Fencepost]

If they do a decent job with low- or mid-range devices they might be able to leverage their name in areas where feature phones persisted longest, but I think that's probably a really hard place to make much money. Sure you can sell phones in Africa, but can you sell them with any kind of profit margin and still sell enough volume to make it worthwhile?