Panasonic to make tough Windows Phones, Nokia happy to have more competition

Microsoft is said to be working closely with Panasonic to bring some rugged Windows Phone into the field. Now whilst you might think, erm, don’t they have rugged WP already with Nokias, well, it’s good to have more players regardless :p.Perhaps Panasonic might add some actual purpose built rugged devices, versus Nokia phones that just happen to be rugged by nature. In all seriousness, some phone versions of their toughpad in the enterprise sounds like a nice option.

It would be great for the end consumer to have some properly waterproof additions. Who knows maybe Sony might bring that into the mix should they join too? Perhaps if that becomes a popular requirement, Nokia, or the team of Nokia at MS might make their own versions.

Wasn’t there another new manufacturer also heading WP? Xolo from India?

In Nokia’s eyes, competition is good for the platform. Bigger platform, more room for sales. That of course is Nokia being confident in being able to keep up with their future portfolio. At the moment, Nokia = WP. If they were to keep some of their software advantages (apps, services, hardware tech) that sounds very possible. But imagine if Microsoft decides to share that out with everyone.

Source: BloomBerg, TechCrunch

Cheers Alvester for the tip!

Category: Nokia