The Utility Blog

Nokia’s latest sales figures do not make pleasant reading. The Finnish manufacturer saw its sales drop and its losses rise during the final quarter of 2011 as sales of its Symbian smartphones dropped off, and it launched a new Windows Phone device which failed to ignite the market.

The Nokia Lumia 800 was one of the first Nokia phones produced since the partnership between the Finnish firm and Microsoft was announced. Although they have released scant details about how it went down, Nokia has revealed they sold “well over 1 million Lumia devices”. A huge marketing campaign, early positive reviews and topping the smartphone lists in both the Netherlands and France for a period, there is no way of knowing whether this was within expected margins or represents a disappointing campaign.

The Windows Phone campaign continues with the Nokia Lumia 900. This looks set to be top tier Nokia Phone, ready to do battle with the biggest boys in the smartphone playground. It keeps to the same design as the Lumia 800, has a 4.3 inch AMOLED display with an 80-0 x 400 pixel resolution and the same ClearBlack technology on the screen. Gorilla Glass means it can take the knocks in the pocket or the handbag and the handset is made again in polycarbonate coming either in matte black or cyan blue. Expect more colours in the same way the Lumia 800 did. It should be speedy too with a 1.4 GHz single core Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU – although why they are not opting for a dual-core may frustrate some, particularly in the US market where this device will be launched which already has 4G. The Lumia 900 comes with a 1 megapixel forward facing camera and a wide angle lens to the rear.

The design looks engaging and fun. It’s looking as though Nokia are focused on a new streamlined and colour enhanced smartphone design. Under the bonnet and in terms of operating system, the Lumia 900 runs Windows Phone 7.5, same as the Lumia 800. Mango showed a great improvement in terms of OS and some have suggested the poor Nokia figures for late 2011 for Nokia represent a lack of take up for Symbian combined with a late emergence of WP. Perhaps with a longer campaign and the opportunity to start the year with a new release, until waiting until the end, it could have a more positive effect. Nokia does not make bad phones and the operating system works well on the Nokia devices.

The Nokia Lumia 900 is currently a US exclusive but at the very least it provides hope of a viable and stylish alternative to the usual players. Nokia does need a success though and it could well spend much of the first half of 2012 pushing the Lumia phone contracts if it wants to make up ground it lost in the months from October to December

Business travel might seem glamorous, but connectivity problems can cause some very un-glamorous headaches

It’s late at night, you’re far from home, it’s hot and steamy. You need to send an urgent e-mail to the office – but there’s no wifi available and you can’t find a 3G signal.

Even if you could, as a lean mean startup you’re worried you might need to sell the office furniture to pay the bill.

This is a situation familiar to anyone who travels – whether on business or simply on holiday.

The rise of the smartphone and our increasing reliance on laptops and tablets, not to mention cloud-based software applications that need an internet connection to work, means many of us find ourselves hostages to high wifi and roaming charges.

In the EU, the European Commission has announced plans to extend the price cap on roaming costs to include data for the first time, with a lower cap on calls received and texts. Despite this charges are likely to remain high.

So what can you do to keep yourself connected – while keeping costs down?

Geneva-based Carole Vivien has worked in IT sales for around 15 years, for some of the biggest companies in the telecoms sector, including BT and AT&T. She now works for US firm Hunt Big Sales, and travels regularly around the world on business.

“I would say that my bill is 95% roaming. Always. Even when I was working for AT&T or whoever,” she says.

“They give you a limit. Let’s say they let you spend £500 to £700 a month for your mobile, but because you’re roaming all the time you’re more likely to spend £2,000 on voice and data.”

About six months ago she ended up stranded at London’s Heathrow Airport after a mix-up with her flights.

While sorting out a hotel room for the night she saw an advert for a new device that provided a pocket wifi hotspot for a flat rate of £4.95 a day by a company called Tep.

“For me after being in telecoms for 15 years, when I saw this sign advertising it I said, ‘Ah finally, someone’s doing that’,” she says.

Personal wifi devices are not new – various network operators offer them for domestic use – but this is aimed at those travelling overseas, allowing you to connect up to five devices in any of the countries supported by the company for the same flat rate. They also provide prepaid smartphones.

Tomas Mendoza is the founder of Tep. He says he got the idea while travelling around south east Asia with his girlfriend, after leaving the hedge fund industry.

“Throughout the trip we realised how difficult it was to remain connected, and how being connected was very, very valuable.

“My mother, she’s 50, she doesn’t know where the sim card is in the phone. Going to another country, finding a sim card, unlocking the phone, it’s something she’ll never do.”

According to research commissioned by the company, the average smartphone data consumption is 10MB a day. Over the course of a 10-day business trip in Europe this could cost around £210 ($338; 240 euros).

When business travellers work on the internet from their phones, that can go up to as much as 40 to 60MB a day, costing between £80 and £120 a day, or between £800 and £1,200 for a 10-day trip.

This is unlikely to change in the near future, according to Juniper Research’s Nitin Bhas.

“Roaming has traditionally provided network operators with an opportunity to gain additional revenues above and beyond regular access fees.

“The ability to stay connected even while roaming across international networks is a key requirement, particularly within the enterprise sector, and operators have traditionally levied a significant surcharge for this privilege, particularly in the case of data services.”

This isn’t the only technology out there that could help you cut your costs. ABroadband.com offer 3G access for 59 cents (84 US cents; 52p) per megabyte in over 50 countries – although you have to factor in the additional cost of buying either a dongle or a sim card.

Onevoice Anywhere is BT’s voip service aimed at business travellers

And some of the big operators are also trying to find solutions for their business customers. BT is due to launch Onevoice Anywhere – a voip (voice over internet protocol) phone service that lets business customers make calls over wifi connected devices.

Steve Masters, BT’s global head of unified communications, says testing has gone very well.”It provides flexibility and functionality for global travellers and will help to significantly reduce global roaming charges,” he says.

There are also apps that claim to help you save money. Onavo is available for iPhone, and will compress the data being received by your phone. Less data means smaller charges – but your data will have to travel through their servers.

Do it yourself

Taking an old handset, or dongle or even Mifi (personal wifi device) and buying a local sim is a possibility – but may only be practicable for longer trips, says Tom Otley of Business Traveller magazine.

Customers may object to calling you on a different, overseas number, and the handset must be unlocked.

Many people rely on the fact that that their hotel will have wifi. Mr Otley says despite the expectations of some travellers, they will often have to pay for it.

Looking for a new mobile phone? Visit our friends at phones4u.co.uk and view the range of great mobile phones they have on offer, there is sure to be something for you

Facebook Phones are being introduced to the world at Mobile World Congress 2011 in Barcelona, Spain, we will look at them in greater detail as we get them. Adopting a dance stance, we do wonder whether future iterations of such handsets will not be enhanced with a suffix, but rather, take on other names like the HTC Rock, HTC HipHop or even HTC Classical. I digress, let us see what these social networking phones are able to do.

First off, the HTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa do stand out from the rest of the smartphones that are on the market simply by virtue of a dedicated Facebook button that delivers one-touch access to the key functions of the Facebook service. Of course, that doesn’t mean that the HTC Sense experience is diminished in any way – no sir, you will find yourself more entrenched in Facebook more than ever now.

After all, with over 500 million active users worldwide, Facebook is a tour de force that will surely be a powerful brand name to be associated with, making sense for HTC to jump at the opportunity.

The Facebook button on the HTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa are context-aware, where it will gently pulse with light whenever there is an opportunity to share content or updates through Facebook. This means pressing it just once will let you update your status, upload a photo, share a Website, and even post the song that you are currently grooving to. How about snapping a photo of friends on your phone and have it uploaded instantly to Facebook?

The possibilities are more or less endless, and perhaps HTC does not want to put all their eggs in a single basket, hence the splitting up of the Facebook phone to theHTC ChaCha and HTC Salsa variants. The former will come in a unique tilt design which shapes the display and physical QWERTY keyboard, making it a snap to see everything that goes on as well as being easy on your fingers as you type. Features include a 5-megapixel color camera with auto focus and LED flash and a VGA front-facing camera, a 2.6-inch, 480 x 320 resolution landscape touch screen.

As for the HTC Salsa that reminds us of the HTC Legend, it is more of what you’re used to if you aren’t a BlackBerry addict, sporting a generous 3.4-inch, 480 x 320 resolution touch display.

Expect both handsets to hit Europe and Asian markets in Q2 this year, while they will arrive Stateside via AT&T in an exclusive agreement. Please wander back for more mobile phone advice.