| 6th March
- T-Mobile is reported to be planning to dump all Nokia handsets which can access
the company's Ovi mobile internet service as it would compete with their own in-house
content platform. German magazine, WirtschaftsWoche reported the story without
naming sources. According to the report, T-Mobile will offer only 10
Nokia phones to customers, which are all incompatible with Ovi, compared with
15 phones five weeks ago.
A T-Mobile spokeswoman did concede that the company
currently does not carry any Ovi compatible Nokia handsets, but did not confirm
that there was a blanket ban on the handsets. "We are currently in
negotiations with Nokia about the Ovi service and are pretty confident to find
a solution soon," she said. The report did not say if the decision
affected T-Mobile only within Germany, or internationally. Last November,
Vodafone agreed to work with the Finnish handset giant to integrate a number of
Internet services, including Nokia's Music Store, on to devices that will begin
selling early next year. Vodafone, which is increasingly trying to offset declining
voice call prices by launching new Internet-based services, will combine its own
software services, with Nokia's Ovi portal and will launch a number of exclusive
"premium" Nokia handsets in 2008, the company said at the time. Back
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