In a world of identical black smartphones, Nokia lets you design your own 3310
The world may be filled with identical and unimaginative black smartphones, but Nokia wants to change that. Taking the road less taken, HMD Global, which revived the Nokia brand, is all set to make phones look colourful and bright once again, just like they were back in the day.
In February this year, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Nokia had unveiled the reboot for one of its most-beloved phones: the Nokia 3310.
This already colourful handset — set to be available in red, dark blue, yellow, and grey — will now have a limited edition, that is going to be much more whacky! Last week, Nokia’s Instagram page bore an announcement: they are looking for artists, designers, and illustrators to come out with creative artworks for the rebooted Nokia 3310.
Those interested can post their work on Instagram with the hashtag #3310art for a chance to have it featured on a limited edition Nokia 3310. Artist have time till May 10 to submit their entries.
A post shared by Nokia Mobile - (@nokiamobile) on
The rebooted 3310 has a 2.4 inch, 240 x 320 resolution display. The phone lets you use the internet with its 2.5G band and an Opera Mini browser. It has a 3.5mm headphone jack and a MicroSD card slot, which successfully makes it an upgrade to the latest iPhone.
And true to all old Nokia feature phones, the 3310 reboot has a 1200mAh battery that offers 22 hour talk-time and month-long standby time. But more importantly it has “Snake”!
While the Nokia 3310 has not hit the markets as of yet, it is expected to be a success. Fans of the original product will get a chance to relive their nostalgia, with a really good feature phone that has decent specs and doesn’t burn a hole in their pockets. The phone’s expected to cost $52 (roughly Rs 3,500). And India does have a big market for feature phones.
According a report in the Economic Times, feature phones continue dominating the market with a more than 55 per cent share. This is because people in small towns and rural areas have little need for or money to buy smartphones.
Also, according to a study conducted by the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) and Kantar IMRB, almost 85 per cent feature phone users do not intend to switch to smartphones on their next purchase.
Nokia may have made a serious error of judgement by not jumping onto the Android bandwagon, back in the day, but they sure know how to break the monotony now.