Nokia (News - Alert), for good or for ill, has largely thrown in its lot with Windows throughout its smartphone line. But now, there are recently-unearthed reports from no less than the CEO of Nokia, Stephen Elop, that suggest that Nokia may be looking to go beyond the smartphone, and branch out into tablets. Not too surprisingly, that tablet will be running Windows 8, if the reports ultimately hold true.

Basically, the reports surround remarks made by Elop to ABC News, saying that Nokia may not have announced any tablets specifically made or in the works already, the growing consensus among Nokia customers was that they wanted one. Elop said that Nokia customers "increasingly are looking for a common digital experience between their smartphone and tablet, with a PC.", and this suggests a pretty clear course of action.

The upcoming release of Windows 8, which will provide a common platform for both tablet and PC development, will also allow developers to focus on applications that will work on the two platforms in concert. This isn't the first time that Nokia's been seen as having an interest in tablets, either, with reports going as far back as March that Nokia was looking into a 10 inch tablet running Windows 8, that boasted a dual-core processor and was geared to compete against offerings from Samsung and Toshiba (News - Alert), among others. Those may not be the specs on the final version, however, as significant advancement has been seen since then.

Nokia's been working with Windows for quite some time now, especially as far as the phones go, so it would be a safe bet that they're looking to a tablet as well, especially considering that recent reports have seen the Windows Phone (News - Alert) platform falling off in terms of market share.

Nokia needs to keep itself in the market, and expanding to other mobile devices is a worthwhile step in doing so. Given that these mobile devices would also likely work very closely with less mobile devices like desktops and even laptops--which aren't always mobile--it would provide not only a new way for people to use both sets of devices, but even provide a way that the PC would actually still be part of the so-called "Post-PC era". It is, after all, quite possible that the term "Post-PC Era" simply refers to an era in which the PC sees compliments, new ways of doing things, rather than replacements. Nokia's tablet, since it too will likely run on Windows 8, will indeed be able to offer several ways that it can work with the PC, as opposed to replacing it.

The earlier reports from last March were projecting the arrival of the device in time for the upcoming holiday shopping season--the fourth quarter of this year--so if Nokia is indeed working to that timetable, we may well be seeing the end result of such measures fairly soon.

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