India | Fone Arena

Vodafone brings 2 new blackberry handsets to India

Vodafone India (Hutch) has introduced the Blackberry 8310 and Blackberry 8820 priced at Rs.24,990 and Rs.31,990
Vodafone acquired Hong Kong-based Hutchison International’s Indian telecom arm Hutch’…

Vodafone India (Hutch) has introduced the Blackberry 8310 and Blackberry 8820 priced at Rs.24,990 and Rs.31,990

Vodafone acquired Hong Kong-based Hutchison International’s Indian telecom arm Hutch’s stake for $11.1 billion in May this year. The company earlier said it would be investing $2 billion in consolidating and expanding its business in the country.

Vodafone Essar, India’s second largest mobile service operator after Airtel, has a subscriber base of 34.11 million and a market share of 20.11 percent as on Aug 31, 2007, according to data released by the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI).

It would be great to see the premium offerrings from Vodafone

Fly enters low cost handset market with V70 and M110

Meridian Mobile – A major player in the telecom (mobile handset) industry are pleased to announce the launch of low cost phones in Indian market under the Fly brand.

‘Fly’ a much sought after brand in the Central Europe market is now creating ripples not only in India but also in Germany, Spain and south Asian markets.

Fly currently has a range of 18 models in the Indian market. All the models are feature packed mid-segment phones. The latest to join the Fly family are the V70 & M110. This takes the number of currently running models to 20.

The V70 & M110 marks the entry of Fly in to the low priced segment. While the phones are reasonably priced, they still flaunt best in class features & stunning looks.

V70 – Candy Bar Phone

V 70 front A smart Candy Bar phone displaying simplicity at its best. It exhibits a lively combination of entertaining features at extremely reasonable prices. This light weight phone offers the most hunted features like MP3 ring tones and USB connect. It has a lot to do with the music lovers as it offers radio FM facility with built in antenna. It also has a 4x zoom VGA Camera for soft clicks and offers a satisfying storage capacity of 500 in phonebook and up to 200 messages. It gives a battery back up of 2 hours and 30 minutes of talk time and remarkable 120 hours at standby mode.

This phone is priced at Rs.3250/-

M110 – Clamshell Phone

M110 A Cute Clamshell mobile fulfilling all the basic requirements with its quality features. It can be connected with the PC sync via USB. It is a high on storage phone with a storage memory of 500 in the phonebook and up to 200 messages. The VGA Camera it offers facilitates the user with 4x Zoom. Enjoy foot tapping music and your favourite numbers every time your phone rings with MP3 ring tones. All these exiting features are available at most reasonable price.

This phone is priced at Rs.3150/-

The new Nokia E51 , E50 gets a major upgrade

Nokia today announced a new member to it E series of phones – the Nokia E51 .

The E Series phones are targeted at business and enterprise user.

The E51 is a sequel to the E50.

Its just 12mm thick but has Wlan ,Bluetooth 2.0 EDR, microSD expansion

Network features include GSM Quad band support, 3G, HSPDA, GPRS and EDGE

Nokia e51

It sports a 2 Mega pixel Camera also.

Other highlights include FM Radio and Music Player.

The E51 is set to hit the stores in October or November and will retail at about EUR 350 or Rs.20,000 in India.

Specifications and Photos

Vodafone India will replace Hutch from September 20

The Hutch pug and the Hutch pink will soon not be seen on Indian screens and hoardings as Vodafone is going to roll out its Global branding in India from September.

Arun Sarin, CEO of Vodafone will unleash the Vodafone logo later this week in India

Vodafone has made bulk bookings on Star and Sony Television for airing the new Ads.

HP launches 2 new PDAs iPAQ 610 and iPAQ 910

HP has announced two new phones in its iPAQ series

HP IPAQ 610

The iPAQ 610 belongs to the Business Navigator series

Features

Quad Band GSM and Tri-band 3G network support
Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0, USB 2.0 Connectivity
GPRS / EDGE / HSDPA data modes
Windows Mobile 6.0 Professional
Inbuilt GPS Receiver
520 MHz Processor and 128 MB RAM
Jog -Wheel style navigation
256 MB internal memory plus microSD expansion
3 Mega pixel camera for LED Flash

HP IPAQ 910

The iPAQ 910 belongs to Business Messenger series.

It sports a QWERTY keypad and has a larger screen. Apart from that all features are identical to the 610.

Pricing is expectd to be announced shortly.

BPL Mobile Tracker – SMS based lost phone watchdog

Being a mobile phone blog we get numerous requests from desperate users who have just lost their phones. Sadly we cant help.

BPL Mobile has come up with an interesting Mobile Tracker solution which sends out an SMS when the SIM Card on your mobile phone is changed. The software works only on some GSM / Nokia Symbian handsets which include

Symbian Series 60 First Edition

7650
3650
3600
3660
3620
Ngage
NgageQD

Symbian Series 60 Second Edition

N70
N72
N90
6630
6680
6681
6682
6600
6620
7610
7710
3230
6260
6670

Symbian Series 60 Third Edition

E65
N91
N80
N73
N71
E70
E61
E60
E50
5500
3250
N95
N93
6290

Thats good news only for Nokia users.35 Handsets are supported as of now.

Features

Rs 149 one time fees. No Monthly Rentals.
Works in the background as a watchdog
Application icon is always hidden and will not allow thief to uninstall
Easy to setup and use
Can be used on all GSM Networks

Mobile Tracker Home Page

Is gPhone is openmoko ?

Rediff.com reported last week that gPhone would be launched in India in September.

We also reported earlier about the gPhone from Google possibly being an iPhone Killer

Now its getting closer. Reports suggest that the gPhone runs Linux and might be a Openmoko phone customized to run Google Apps like Gmail, Gtalk,Google Mobile Maps,News , Youtube and Calendar.

Possible Features

GPRS/EDGE (Wi-Fi – Not for sure in the $100 Version)
GPS
Touchscreen
Linux Based OS
All Google Mobile Apps pre-installed
Ticker Ads

Price

The price is expected to be around $100 or Rs.4000 approx for the entry level phone. There might be a high end phone with better features and might compete with the iPhone.

At this stage. This news is still a rumor and there’s not official confirmation about the phone.

But there’s enough evidence that Google is working on a phone as Google has accepted that its in talk with Operators in India

Nokia E61i Review

Nokia E61i is an enterprise phone loaded with features. It gives Blackberry handsets some serious competition.

Update : Nokia E71 is out and chk out the review

The handset fits snuggly in the hand (at least for me)

The design is impressive and has luxury touch added to it due to the metallic finish similar to the 8800

The phone is an upgraded version of the E61 which lacked a Camera and had a primitive browser. But the built of the E61i is much better than the E61. The keypad has undergone a transformation for the better.

Continue reading “Nokia E61i Review”

India beats USA to emerge as the second largest market for Nokia

Nokia India is now the second largest market for the Finnish Mobile phone Maker.

China continues to be the no.1 . USA was at no.1 and is now moved to no.2

Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo is in India for meeting some goverment officials .

Nokia Chennai’s Sriperumbudur plant has produced 60 Million handsets so far and about 50 % of them have been exported to over 58 countries

via [nokia press]

Nokia 6555 3G Clamshell

Nokia 6555 is the latest addition to Nokia’s range of phones.

It shares points with the Prism Collection and the 8600 Luna.

The 6555 is a 3G Clamshell .

Features

Analogue timepiece standby display
Quadband / 3G Network Enabled
1.3 Mega Pixel Camera
QVGA Display with 16 Million Colors
Bluetooth, micro USB

Price

It will be available next month for a price of about (200 Euros) Rs.12000

Nokia India brand image under attack

The brand image for Nokia India is under serious threat due to the recent Nokia battery recall which we had covered last week.

nokia-india.battery.jpg

The company even made a status check possible via SMS to 5555 with the BT <26 digit battery no>.

But panic struck people are thronging Nokia service centers and dealers to check the status of their battery.

About 4-5 % of phones in India are affected according to IntoMobile

Airtel, Hutch and other operators are co-operating with Nokia according to HT

Nokia CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo is going to be in India on Aug 22-24 . May be to have a idea of ground level situation in the country.

But He’s coming for meeting Top government officials.

via [IntoMobile]

Mobile Prices for August Updated

Hello Friends,

We have updated the mobile prices for August to help you purchase the handset of your choice.

The Highlights of this month are

We will be adding some new Brands to the list of phones and update their prices also.

Please post your comments and suggestions so that we can improve the site.

Nokia opens its design studio in India

Nokia has partnered with Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore, India for the first of its kind design studio in India.Nokia has picked India as a starting point for a series of satellite design studios it plans to establish in design hot spots around the world, signaling the increasing impact the country is having on the development of mobile phones. Established via a two year partnership with the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology in Bangalore, it will give Nokia designers and India’s talented young designers the opportunity to work together on new design ideas for India and the global markets.

Alastair Curtis, Nokia’s Chief Designer and Ms. Geetha Narayanan, Founder & Director, Srishti has issued a joint press release today.

Looks like Nokia wants to do some serious research on designing handsets for the Indian user.

Feel happy the Indian Mobile User is given importance.

http://srishti.ac.in/

Sony Ericsson announces 8 new phones for India

Some great news for Sony Ericsson fans in India. Thanks to a market demands in India – product launch divides between rest of the world and India is getting shorter. Until a year back, new mobile handsets would atleast 2-3 months or even more to surface in India.

Last week Sony Ericsson announced 8 new phones for the Indian market

P1i – the business smartphone

Walkman phones

W580i

W910i

W960i

Cybershot phones

K810i

k850i

and under the general category

S500i and the T650i

All the phones are expected to be available with all mobile retailers across the country immediately.

Nokia N81 looks likely

The Device profile of yet another phone has been spotted on Nokia’s Developer forum. This time its the Nokia N81

Its a 8 GB slider phone and is a sequel to the N91 8 Gb edition.

Specs

8GB Internal Memory
Over 12 Hrs of Music Playback
3G, Video Calling
Dual Camera
Slide form factor

The phone if not a rumor is expected to be launched in Q4 2007

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