Nokia ready to take on BlackBerry, iPhone

NEW DELHI: Nokia, the world���s largest handset maker, will launch an e-mail platform for its mid- and high-end handsets on Wednesday as it attempts to challenge the dominance of RIM���s BlackBerry and Apple���s iPhone, both known for their better e-mail services.

While Nokia is the market leader in handset sales in India by a long shot, the company so far did not have an answer to BlackBerry���s e-mail services widely used by corporates and other high-end users.

Nokia will first debut its new messaging and e-mail solution on its business-oriented E-series phone E75 in India, before extending it to other E-series and N-series handsets here. At present, all of Nokia���s high-end phones fall into two camps, the E series for enterprise and corporate use and the N series for entertainment such as video, photographs and music.

Currently, Nokia does not have an e-mail platform to allow its users to view e-mails from different accounts through a common client. Nokia users currently view their e-mail using its mail for exchange service, but the catch is that it supports only a single e-mail account at a time. It had also launched Nokia Messaging push e-mail service for its high-end handsets such as E71 and N95.



In a bid to address the needs of corporates, Nokia was earlier offering BlackBerry Connect platform on several of its earlier E-series handsets. But, the latest phones from Nokia, such as the E75, don���t offer BlackBerry Connect. On the other hand, BlackBerry���s strength is that it allows customers to read and reply to multiple e-mail accounts with a single client. Put simply, BlackBerry users need not log-in multiple times into each of their corporate and personal accounts separately.

Instead, they can access all their e-mail accounts with a single click. Now for the first time, Nokia consumers will be able to aggregate all e-mail accounts through one client supporting up to 16 email accounts such as Gmail, Yahoo, MSN and a host of other e-mail providers. Besides, the new e-mail user interface supports a host of other consumer-friendly features such as one-click reply, expanding views, folder support and HTML support.

���This (email for corporates on the handsets) is one area where we are not present. We did not have a solution for these users, but we are all set to launch it. You will soon see us market this product aggressively as we feel that we can be a strong player in this space,��� Nokia India���s director for marketing Vineet Taneja said replying to a query from ET during an event in Chennai last week.

The E75, which Nokia will launch on Wednesday, is a candy bar phone with a horizontal sliding Qwerty keyboard. It comes with a 3.2 megapixel camera and a 2.4-inch screen. Apart from push e-mail, it has Quickoffice for viewing and editing documents, a PDF viewer, Zip file management, and Nokia���s mapping system which uses an internal A-GPS receiver.