That's it. When Nokia introduces its first Windows Phone handsets later this year, Nokia U.S. president Chris Weber told All Things D, it's going to pack up shop with its Symbian and Series 40 phones and devote its fortunes in the U.S. to Windows Phone.
The decision comes after more than a decade of Nokia phones being sold in the U.S. Nokia had its American heyday in the middle of the last decade, between about 2002-2005, when it seemed like everyone owned either a Nokia bar phone or a Motorola flip.
Symbian, the world's most popular smartphone OS, never made a big splash here. In 2004 a bunch of popular phones came out with Symbian Series 60, including the Nokia 3650, 6620 and 7610. But they never grabbed popular attention as smartphones, and smartphones took off just as Nokia's ability to get its phones supported by U.S. carriers faded.
Truly great Nokia smartphones like the N95 and E71 became cult classics, with their fame spread by word of mouth rather than by carrier marketing, and their prices were kept high due to a lack of subsidies.
Even as Nokia declined towards single-digit market share here in the States, it had the occasional hit. The 5310 music phone for T-Mobile was an excellent example of what Nokia did well: it was slim and well built, with excellent hardware and call quality.
Nokia has the opportunity to reinvent itself with Windows Phone. The rumors about "Sea Ray," Nokia's first Windows Phone device, make it look like a solid, good-looking phone using an OS that's already popular with US carriers. Nokia could rise again.
Click on the slideshow above for some of Nokia's most popular U.S. phones.
Source:http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2390908,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05039TX1K0000762
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