9 ms·

Nokia D1C: The Comeback

82 points by ereli1 10y ago

piyush_soni 10y ago
That's a pretty 'average' phone for a comeback.
- Nokinside 10y ago
  Nokia just collects licensing fees from this. The main force behind this is Foxconn who wants to reduce its dependency on Apple. HMD global incensed the brand and sells and markets the phones. Foxconn is manufacturing the phones and also behind the funding. Nokia has seat in the board and and it gives HMD global access to Nokia patents and R&D that comes out from Nokia Technologies.
  - stuaxo 10y ago
    They could at least try and make it look like a Nokia phone on the outside.
- droid8 10y ago
  It's not like they have to live up to any particularly high expectations... As a brand, their history is made of two decades of mediocrity in both design and technology. If a new brand licensing on Android phones was all they could come up with, it's no surprise their CTO left two months ago.
  - Nokinside 10y ago
    Nokia was known for the quality of its phones trough 90's up to mid 2000's.
  - fsloth 10y ago
    Where did you get the two decades? Before IPhone came 10 years ago and changed the game from hardware to software plus ecosystem Nokia's phones were in the top category - no, sorry, they were in all of the categories since there were so many of them. Even after IPhone Nokia had years of great market position. Technology wise mediocre? Thats.. not really the general perception. Perhaps the fact that Nokia tanked as fast as it did creates a shadow over the history before this.
amiga-workbench 10y ago
Such a shame trojan horse Elop tanked the company by partnering with Microsoft, I'd have loved to see more of their Linux based phones, I've still got a Nokia N9 which has to be my favourite handset so far. I hope Ubuntu for phones can gain at least some traction.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  He wasn't a trojan horse, how long is this lie keep being repeated?! The Nokia board themselves had a clause on the contract with Elop that he would get a nice bonus if he managed to sell the company! I blame those executives looking at their own bank accounts than Elop, which like any manager was just making sure the contract would be fulfilled. Lots of press already discussed this in Finland.
  - agumonkey 10y ago
    Are there any articles in english about this ? Why would the Nokia board throw this huge empire in the ground ? They won more by selling the mobile phone div. than by trying to compete ?
    - pjmlp 10y ago
      Yes, here is some information. "Elop was entitled to immediate share price performance bonus in case of a “change of control” situation… such as selling of Nokia’s handset division. " http://www.forbes.com/sites/terokuittinen/2013/09/24/nokia-admits-giving-misleading-information-about-elops-compensation/#71a7abcc21d3 http://www.forbes.com/sites/terokuittinen/2013/09/24/nokia-a... http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-know-why-nokias-elop-had-a-25m-personal-bonus-clause-from-the-nokia-board-if-he-was-able-to-s.html http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-... There are lots of others sources if you search for "nokia board Elop clauses"-
- doikor 10y ago
  Nokia tanked well before Elop came around. Basically the refusal to accept the fact that Symbian was going nowhere killed them. If they did the switch sooner (while they still had some market share) to pretty much anything else I think they would have had a chance.
nine_k 10y ago
This is not a comeback. This is a once-famous name being reused, it seems. Imagine if Apple went out if business and then "returned" with an Android phone.
- jbkkd 10y ago
  This isn't quite the same. Apple's platform is a closed garden. Hardware and software are bundled together and are inseparable. There can be no iPhone without iOS. Nokia didn't do that. They had Symbian, Windows Phones and Asha to name a few. What's happening here is Nokia taking their excellent hardware for which they were known for (remember those phones you could throw at a wall?), and sticking Android on it as the operating system - just like they would do with Windows Phone.
  - nine_k 10y ago
    I'll be very glad if Nokia ends up making very good Android phones. Lumias were quite good, too, from the hardware perspective. What is the saddest part is the loss of their mobile OS effort; it had a number of good UI ideas. BTW I wonder when some reasonably large player will try to offer an entirely (or at least significantly) different UX on top of Android's open-source core.
  - cwyers 10y ago
    No, they're likely just putting their name on some other OEM's Android phones.
gm-conspiracy 10y ago
Any recommendations for a small form-factor, yet functional, Android phone (about the size of an iPhone 4/S)?
- TobbenTM 10y ago
  Can't go wrong with the Nexus phones. 5X sounds like your ideal phone. Or perhaps the new pixel phones.
  - cptskippy 10y ago
    Except he wanted something smaller. The Nexus 4, 5, and 5x are all much bigger than an iPhone 4.
    - refulgentis 10y ago
      Except hes looking for a small form factor Android phone, roughly the size of a iPhone 4s, not a phone that has to be smaller than a 4s. OP, grandparent is correct, I was in your situation and a 5X was perfect. Pixel and Pixel XL look like they'll be too big, but you should wait for the October 4th event to confirm.
    - tigershark 10y ago
      And probably slower than an iPhone 5s. Honestly I don't really understand how is it possible that google throws out a phone that is slower than is predecessor (the Nexus 5) and still manages to sell a huge amount of devices.
- 0xFFC 10y ago
  With Android huge update problem, I wouldn't go near to Android phone,unless Google's own phone. Let be honest Android manufacturers, just ripping off people and don't care a little bit about customer experience/security. Think about this fact , many of high end phone from last year or year before that (which customer spent ~700$ -which is quite money-) has not fixed stagefright vulnerability and don't have any plan to update to new version. Thats total fraud , which they pull off (manufacturers).
youdontknowtho 10y ago
Yeah...the name nokia has been licensed to a couple of different consumer devices. the only remnant of the old nokia that still exits is a networking device company that makes infrastructure for data and cell networks. these are not the droids you are looking for...
- rhblake 10y ago
  That "remnant" is much larger than the handset division they sold. 114k employees after acquiring Alcatel-Lucent. Seems to be doing well. (I just learned that Bell Labs is now "Nokia Bell Labs".)
  - youdontknowtho 10y ago
    Thanks for the update. That's interesting news.
    - ptaipale 10y ago
      In fact Nokia always was an infrastructure company. (Well, "always" as in "telecommunication infrastructure products since 1960's", i.e. it started in telecoms about 100 years after its founding in 1867). One can always say that there are other mistakes Nokia did. Like, why did it not acquire Cisco back around 1990 when it could have done it? But then again, many other Nokia acquisitions did not work so well so very likely Nokia Cisco wouldn't have been anything like Cisco is now. Nokia came to telecom infra because before that it was a cable manufacturer, and it came to cable manufacturing due to being a rubber product manufacturer, and before that it was also wood industry manufacturer. You can still by "Nokian" brand boots and shoes in Europe, although it's a separate company, and you can also buy "Nokian" brand car and bicycle tyres, though that is another separate company. (I worked in Nokia's infra side for 20 years and 1 day.)
      - youdontknowtho 10y ago
        That's true. They bought a company back in the 90s that had a technology that was a big influence on MPLS. Ipsilon? Something like that. It would assign tags to packets and then let you assign tags to specific paths.
b34r 10y ago
They're not coming back. Being a smartphone OEM is a massive money sink with little upside unless you're the #1 or #2 player in a market. Wearables, VR, health, etc are the next targets for Nokia.
- jpalomaki 10y ago
  Probably they are not coming back, but it seems to be that they are not closing the door either. This whole deal seems to be setup so that they could just acquire the newly formed "HMD global" in future IF they wanted to do a comeback. [1] http://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/18/nokia-phones-are-back-after-microsoft-sells-mobile-assets-for-350-million-to-foxconn-hmd.html http://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/18/nokia-phones-are-back-after-m...
theklub 10y ago
I want a refresh on the Nokia Communicator. I want a micro laptop.
- agumonkey 10y ago
  Casio sold some a while ago https://youtu.be/qZ7TUJQjH74?t=68 https://youtu.be/qZ7TUJQjH74?t=68
Zigurd 10y ago
It's good to see they have Android 7. It shows a lack of product management savvy at most OEMs that they don't get that delivering up-to-date Android might be a key advantage in selling Android phones.
vamur 10y ago
Nokia has only themselves to blame for the downfall of their brand. There was a time then a Nokia phone was a status symbol. Now it's a gimmick at best. If they didn't jump on a DOA platform and instead concentrated on the high-end Android market, they would still be #1 or #2 in Europe at least. Now they now collect paltry licensing fees on a yet another Foxconn phone, which judging by specs is obsolete anyway.
627467 10y ago
This looks like another "Alcatel" phone, a classic brand inside comoditized hw. I would pay to have android running my Nokia lumia phones. (like someone manage to get onto the lumia 525).

82 points by ereli1 10y ago

piyush_soni 10y ago

That's a pretty 'average' phone for a comeback.

Nokinside 10y ago
Nokia just collects licensing fees from this. The main force behind this is Foxconn who wants to reduce its dependency on Apple. HMD global incensed the brand and sells and markets the phones. Foxconn is manufacturing the phones and also behind the funding. Nokia has seat in the board and and it gives HMD global access to Nokia patents and R&D that comes out from Nokia Technologies.
- stuaxo 10y ago
  They could at least try and make it look like a Nokia phone on the outside.
droid8 10y ago
It's not like they have to live up to any particularly high expectations... As a brand, their history is made of two decades of mediocrity in both design and technology. If a new brand licensing on Android phones was all they could come up with, it's no surprise their CTO left two months ago.
- Nokinside 10y ago
  Nokia was known for the quality of its phones trough 90's up to mid 2000's.
- fsloth 10y ago
  Where did you get the two decades? Before IPhone came 10 years ago and changed the game from hardware to software plus ecosystem Nokia's phones were in the top category - no, sorry, they were in all of the categories since there were so many of them. Even after IPhone Nokia had years of great market position. Technology wise mediocre? Thats.. not really the general perception. Perhaps the fact that Nokia tanked as fast as it did creates a shadow over the history before this.

amiga-workbench 10y ago

Such a shame trojan horse Elop tanked the company by partnering with Microsoft, I'd have loved to see more of their Linux based phones, I've still got a Nokia N9 which has to be my favourite handset so far. I hope Ubuntu for phones can gain at least some traction.

pjmlp 10y ago
He wasn't a trojan horse, how long is this lie keep being repeated?! The Nokia board themselves had a clause on the contract with Elop that he would get a nice bonus if he managed to sell the company! I blame those executives looking at their own bank accounts than Elop, which like any manager was just making sure the contract would be fulfilled. Lots of press already discussed this in Finland.
- agumonkey 10y ago
  Are there any articles in english about this ? Why would the Nokia board throw this huge empire in the ground ? They won more by selling the mobile phone div. than by trying to compete ?
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    Yes, here is some information. "Elop was entitled to immediate share price performance bonus in case of a “change of control” situation… such as selling of Nokia’s handset division. " http://www.forbes.com/sites/terokuittinen/2013/09/24/nokia-admits-giving-misleading-information-about-elops-compensation/#71a7abcc21d3 http://www.forbes.com/sites/terokuittinen/2013/09/24/nokia-a... http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-know-why-nokias-elop-had-a-25m-personal-bonus-clause-from-the-nokia-board-if-he-was-able-to-s.html http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2013/09/now-we-... There are lots of others sources if you search for "nokia board Elop clauses"-
doikor 10y ago
Nokia tanked well before Elop came around. Basically the refusal to accept the fact that Symbian was going nowhere killed them. If they did the switch sooner (while they still had some market share) to pretty much anything else I think they would have had a chance.

nine_k 10y ago

This is not a comeback. This is a once-famous name being reused, it seems. Imagine if Apple went out if business and then "returned" with an Android phone.

jbkkd 10y ago
This isn't quite the same. Apple's platform is a closed garden. Hardware and software are bundled together and are inseparable. There can be no iPhone without iOS. Nokia didn't do that. They had Symbian, Windows Phones and Asha to name a few. What's happening here is Nokia taking their excellent hardware for which they were known for (remember those phones you could throw at a wall?), and sticking Android on it as the operating system - just like they would do with Windows Phone.
- nine_k 10y ago
  I'll be very glad if Nokia ends up making very good Android phones. Lumias were quite good, too, from the hardware perspective. What is the saddest part is the loss of their mobile OS effort; it had a number of good UI ideas. BTW I wonder when some reasonably large player will try to offer an entirely (or at least significantly) different UX on top of Android's open-source core.
- cwyers 10y ago
  No, they're likely just putting their name on some other OEM's Android phones.

gm-conspiracy 10y ago

Any recommendations for a small form-factor, yet functional, Android phone (about the size of an iPhone 4/S)?

TobbenTM 10y ago
Can't go wrong with the Nexus phones. 5X sounds like your ideal phone. Or perhaps the new pixel phones.
- cptskippy 10y ago
  Except he wanted something smaller. The Nexus 4, 5, and 5x are all much bigger than an iPhone 4.
  - refulgentis 10y ago
    Except hes looking for a small form factor Android phone, roughly the size of a iPhone 4s, not a phone that has to be smaller than a 4s. OP, grandparent is correct, I was in your situation and a 5X was perfect. Pixel and Pixel XL look like they'll be too big, but you should wait for the October 4th event to confirm.
  - tigershark 10y ago
    And probably slower than an iPhone 5s. Honestly I don't really understand how is it possible that google throws out a phone that is slower than is predecessor (the Nexus 5) and still manages to sell a huge amount of devices.
0xFFC 10y ago
With Android huge update problem, I wouldn't go near to Android phone,unless Google's own phone. Let be honest Android manufacturers, just ripping off people and don't care a little bit about customer experience/security. Think about this fact , many of high end phone from last year or year before that (which customer spent ~700$ -which is quite money-) has not fixed stagefright vulnerability and don't have any plan to update to new version. Thats total fraud , which they pull off (manufacturers).

youdontknowtho 10y ago

Yeah...the name nokia has been licensed to a couple of different consumer devices. the only remnant of the old nokia that still exits is a networking device company that makes infrastructure for data and cell networks. these are not the droids you are looking for...

rhblake 10y ago
That "remnant" is much larger than the handset division they sold. 114k employees after acquiring Alcatel-Lucent. Seems to be doing well. (I just learned that Bell Labs is now "Nokia Bell Labs".)
- youdontknowtho 10y ago
  Thanks for the update. That's interesting news.
  - ptaipale 10y ago
    In fact Nokia always was an infrastructure company. (Well, "always" as in "telecommunication infrastructure products since 1960's", i.e. it started in telecoms about 100 years after its founding in 1867). One can always say that there are other mistakes Nokia did. Like, why did it not acquire Cisco back around 1990 when it could have done it? But then again, many other Nokia acquisitions did not work so well so very likely Nokia Cisco wouldn't have been anything like Cisco is now. Nokia came to telecom infra because before that it was a cable manufacturer, and it came to cable manufacturing due to being a rubber product manufacturer, and before that it was also wood industry manufacturer. You can still by "Nokian" brand boots and shoes in Europe, although it's a separate company, and you can also buy "Nokian" brand car and bicycle tyres, though that is another separate company. (I worked in Nokia's infra side for 20 years and 1 day.)
    - youdontknowtho 10y ago
      That's true. They bought a company back in the 90s that had a technology that was a big influence on MPLS. Ipsilon? Something like that. It would assign tags to packets and then let you assign tags to specific paths.

b34r 10y ago

They're not coming back. Being a smartphone OEM is a massive money sink with little upside unless you're the #1 or #2 player in a market. Wearables, VR, health, etc are the next targets for Nokia.

jpalomaki 10y ago
Probably they are not coming back, but it seems to be that they are not closing the door either. This whole deal seems to be setup so that they could just acquire the newly formed "HMD global" in future IF they wanted to do a comeback. [1] http://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/18/nokia-phones-are-back-after-microsoft-sells-mobile-assets-for-350-million-to-foxconn-hmd.html http://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/18/nokia-phones-are-back-after-m...

theklub 10y ago

I want a refresh on the Nokia Communicator. I want a micro laptop.

agumonkey 10y ago
Casio sold some a while ago https://youtu.be/qZ7TUJQjH74?t=68 https://youtu.be/qZ7TUJQjH74?t=68

Zigurd 10y ago

It's good to see they have Android 7. It shows a lack of product management savvy at most OEMs that they don't get that delivering up-to-date Android might be a key advantage in selling Android phones.

vamur 10y ago

Nokia has only themselves to blame for the downfall of their brand. There was a time then a Nokia phone was a status symbol. Now it's a gimmick at best. If they didn't jump on a DOA platform and instead concentrated on the high-end Android market, they would still be #1 or #2 in Europe at least. Now they now collect paltry licensing fees on a yet another Foxconn phone, which judging by specs is obsolete anyway.

627467 10y ago

This looks like another "Alcatel" phone, a classic brand inside comoditized hw. I would pay to have android running my Nokia lumia phones. (like someone manage to get onto the lumia 525).