Nokia Reveals UMA Phone, Partnerships

Nokia made a host of announcements Monday in conjunction with the opening of the annual 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, including its first UMA capable device, a deal to increase usage of the S60 smartphone platform, and a cooperation agreement with Sony Ericsson regarding DVB-H technology.

The Nokia 6136 phone will be the company's first entrant in the UMA space, a technology that supporters say is useful in areas of little or no coverage. The 6136 would be able to switch between a GSM and wireless network without dropping the call, Nokia says.

To support the launch of the phone, the manufacturer has also announced a solution that would allow a carrier to offer cellular and data services over a WLAN. Nokia says the two products allow the company to offer an end-to-end solution.

"We strongly believe that the technological developments announced here today will provide the basis for a future of faster, easier and more cost-effective mobile telephony services," Nokia chairman and CEO Jorma Ollila said in his keynote address at 3GSM.

Ollila said Nokia expects to ship some 40 million 3G/WCDMA devices during the year.

Along with its phone announcements, Nokia also said that it was working with Vodafone to make its S60 smartphone platform a standard software option in the company's device lineup. Nokia said it wishes to expand the market for S60 as a multivendor platform.

Nokia's S60, along with Symbian based devices, have seen much success recently, with both platforms beating out Microsoft's Windows Mobile in market share surveys.

Finally, Nokia announced Monday that it had penned a deal with Sony Ericsson to ensure DVB-H interoperability among their devices. The technology would allow for television broadcasts to be received through mobile devices without clogging the carrier's cellular network, as it is a separate technology.

“We are pleased to announce this co-operation with Nokia on developing DVB-H inter-operability as we believe this will be one of the key technologies driving the mobile TV market in the future," Sony Ericsson CTO Mats Lindof said of the news.

The agreement would take effect immediately in both companies' future DVB-H devices.

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