Finnish tech company Nokia, who sold their Lumia and mobile handset business to Microsoft back in 2013, seems to possibly be looking at returning to handset market with images of a purported handset called the C1 showing up on the net.
The images, which clearly show the company name on the back of the handset, apparently shows a 5″ 1080p display display incased what could be a full metal body or at least a plastic look alike, though a metal body is far more expected given it would be following the same design look of its current N1 tablet. There’s a lot of rumours but there is speculation that the phone will be of a ‘budget class’ handset, using an Intel Atom (or possibly Y series) processor and 2GB of RAM along with the only standout feature of the C1, that being that it will launch with Android M (Marshmallow, 6.0). So, here’s what it looks like:
Now, is it real? Probably not, it’s most likely a prototype made by the division but will most likely not see the light of day. While phone fans would love to see a Nokia handset (though memories of the Nokia X have left a long-standing bad taste in the mouth) the terms of the Microsoft deal which saw their mobile division purchased outright very likely precludes making a mobile phone – the Nokia N1 tablet skirts this by a few factors, chiefly among which is that it’s not a phone.
If there is movement on any phones being launched out of Nokia, you can bet we’ll be interested to see what they have to offer. Nokia has a lot of good credit in Australia when it comes to recognisable brand names in mobile phones, so launching a decent mid-range Android phone could be a great way to re-introduce a mobile division once whatever deal with Microsoft expires.
