Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo live at D7
Here we go again! Olli-Pekka (or OP, as Walt just told us he likes to be called) has taken the stage... read on for more!
Thanks to our editor-at-large and gdgt co-founder Ryan Block for handling photo duties during the show!
3:53PM Now, questions. Well that was underwhelming.
3:51PM Walt: But AT&T isn't carrying this phone (the N97). You're excited about it, and I think people thought it was cool, but no one is carrying it here.
OP: We're working on it.
Walt: Because if you don't, you're going up against $199 phones with a $699 phone.
3:50PM Walt: In your redefinition, do the operators lose some of their power?
OP: No, it's not a power game. It's a question of innovating together. I think our relationship with AT&T is the best representation of that.
3:49PM OP: We've been trying to make US specific phones right here in America. We've increased our work here. And we're working with your carriers, and I think we're getting great traction. The E71X on AT&T, the new app store you just saw. It's just a matter of hard work and perseverance.
3:47PM Walt: 40 percent of the world market, it looks like it's on par with the Pre, the iPhone... but you don't have a carrier. I know America isn't the biggest deal, I'm not trying to be too pro-American. But what is your problem with the US?
3:46PM And that's that for the demo. Now back to a calm, controlled conversation.
3:45PM Another yell: battery life? Walt is getting angry. He's going to go down there and teach these hooligans a lesson they'll never forget.
3:45PM Someone yells from the audience "video chat?" Yes, yes sir. You can do video chat.
3:44PM Davis is driving this home: this is the REAL internet. Not MOBILE internet. Do you get it? It's real, not fake, like all that other junk.
3:43PM Now Davis is showing off a Twitter client for the phone. Gravity. Looks quite nice, but not drastically better than most mobile clients we've seen. Walt: "I understand you had some problems with your Ovi launch..." OP: "Because of high volumes..." Davis: "And that's the N97..." OP: "Maybe you can slide it open." Big laughs. "I totally forgot about the keyboard!"
3:41PM "So I want to talk about the Ovi Store. This is more than just an application store. It knows where I live, what I like..." Walt: "So it's kind of like a stalker?"
3:40PM "3D maps, turn by turn..." Walt: "Is that because you own Navteq?"
3:39PM "On this device, we've got text-to-speech." We're hearing one of Davis' emails. Robot voice on this demo: "I'm worried about you folding under the pressure." Chuckles from the audience.
3:37PM Walt: "Stereo speakers?" He seems impressed. We half expect him to say "I'll take it!" at any moment.
3:37PM "This is 32GB internal storage." Walt seems blown away. Walt: "Okay... $699 at the moment." He seems like he's contemplating purchase right now.
3:36PM Wow, the picture app is so clunky. Really stuttery when switching modes / between pics.
3:35PM Davis is propping widgets. Have you heard the news? Widgets are all the rage these days. He's showing off the realtime Facebook feed, realtime AP news ticker (that's kind of cool). "This is all customizable. These will be available on the Ovi Store..." Walt: "The what store?" Ha!
3:33PM Demo time. Let's see OP work this N97. Oh wait, it's Nokia's demo guy, Davis Fields. "This is the best device we've ever made to achieve our motto, 'connecting people'." OP: "Correct." Huge laughs. Cute.
3:33PM Walt: What carrier? What price?
OP: Open channel.
AKA, no carrier right now.
3:32PM Here we go... the N97, which should come as no surprise if you pay attention to this site. And you do, don't you?
3:32PM OP: Well, we actually have 3. S30, S40, S60. We are pragmatic. So we need to look at different possibilities.
Walt: So you're going to war with Symbian. Did you bring a new phone here?
OP: I've got many... let's look at this demo. N97. I think it's very impressive.
3:30PM Walt: If Symbian is so great, why do you have Maemo?
3:30PM Walt: On your OS, you turned it over to an open source consortium. You have less control in it now. Why?
OP: Well that's true. But we want to make it bigger, better, faster. We have Apple, RIM, LiMO, Palm... and of course Windows Mobile. The only one that is open and mature is Symbian. 250 million phones using it. Clearly the market leader here.
3:28PM OP: Well that's true, but we've been doing Symbian for years. But there's still a lot of learning. We've acquired a lot of companies, navigation, gaming... we acquired Navteq.
3:27PM OP: When it comes to operating systems though, we are competitors. The idea of the App Store, what Apple is doing, we're going to do that on a wide scale. The idea of a device and services.
Walt: You don't have a strong rep as a software company. That's becoming the crucial element in these "handheld computers" -- you talk about Google and Microsoft and Apple... they make hardware, but they're software companies.
3:25PM Walt: Your new competitors, like Apple, if we're talking about a new mobile computing platform, they have a lot of experience in the computing space.
OP: Yes, you can compete some of the time, but you need to partner with these companies. Like I'm using Exchange on my E71.
3:24PM Walt: How many Nokia phones are out there?
OP: Over a billion.
Big applause. Yeah, that's no laughing matter.
Walt: Who are you competitors in this new smartphone space?
OP: 3 years ago I would have said Motorola. Today, you talk about new players. You have to include the Koreans, but then Microsoft, Google, RIM... and Apple. It's a mighty crop of companies.
