More recently Nokia has put out some quite noteworthy products. They are few and far between, but things are getting interesting once more. The top end of the Lumia series (particularly the Lumia 900 phone) is a package of both gorgeous hardware and a pretty cool interface. Nokia’s new route planner incorporates public transport data in ways far superior to Google’s attempts so far. The WebGL-based Google Earth-style Nokia Global Maps 3D is – despite limited geographies – fantastic, particularly for something that runs in your browser. (…)
It’s hard to tell if these positive hits recently have been more or less lucky or if they are the first manifestations of a larger change inside the company. And if it is a larger change, is it too little too late? We’ll have to wait and see. I just know that there’s something going on there that brought Nokia back on the radar – in all the good ways.
Oh, how I remember the headline: “Nokia Microsoft is like Yahoo Bing – Nokia’s days as innovator are over”. The day Nokia started using Windows’ Mobile OS as it’s main smartphone OS, everyone agreed that their days as a leading market force were over. They stopped fighting and let Symbian die – and with it all innovation.
Interestingly, as Peter notes, quite the opposite is true. It seems Nokia is re-focusing. And that is a very good thing.
