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Nokia unveils the 15th of its Asha series phone [Business Daily (Kenya)](Business Daily (Kenya) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Nokia has unveiled its 15th mobile phone brand under the Asha series, a range of the low-cost smart feature phone targeted at the youth who are active users of social media. The Finnish giant on Wednesday announced the Nokia Asha 210, a budget smartphone that the firm hopes to ward off increased competition from Samsung and Huawei in the smart devices category. Nokia is banking on the new model to gain a larger piece of the smartphone market, which accounts for almost a quarter or 23 per cent of total devices sold in Kenya last year. The firm says the device is designed to offer greater social experience as it has a WhatsApp button for fast access to instant messaging and supports Wi-Fi to allow users access wireless Internet. "It has been designed to allow people to easily update their social networks, stay in touch with friends and share user created content," said Nokia executive vice president Timo Toikkanen. The Asha 210 will be available in Kenya from June this year and will retail at Sh6,050. An onslaught by Korean brand Samsung and Chinese firms Huawei, Tecno and Forme with affordable entry-level smartphones has eaten into Nokia's stranglehold of the Kenyan cellphone market To fend off increasing competition, Nokia last year unveiled the Asha series targeted at the youth and those upgrading from feature phones. There are 14 other Asha handsets that have already been released into markets by Nokia. Asha 205 retails at Sh5,999 and the 303 series costs Sh12,999. Samsung has been promoting its low-end smartphones in the Galaxy range such as the Pocket and Mini, which cost Sh9,999 and Sh12,999 respectively. Huawei has partnered with telecoms service provider Safaricom to sell its flagship smartphone Ideos Ascend Y-100, for Sh5,999. Nokia's Asha 305 was voted the best entry level phone at this year's Global Mobile Awards, continuing its dominance in the segment where it also won last year's award with its C3 model. The Finnish giant has now turned to Microsoft's Windows Mobile in its high-end devices series dubbed Lumia. The entry-level Lumia 510 powered by Windows Phone 7.5 trades in Kenya at Sh 16,900. Kenyans buy an average of 350,000 new mobile phones every month, helping propel the country's teledensity to 78 per cent as at the end of December last year. (c) 2013 Nation Media Group. All Rights Reserved. Provided by Syndigate.info an Albawaba.com company |