Nokia is gearing up for its biggest launch of this year so far – the Nokia Lumia 930 and the 830, and the phones are likely to set new benchmarks in value-for-money in the higher end segment.
UPDATE- Nokia is launching the Lumia 830 on Wednesday in Mumbai. Expected price Rs 22,000.
The Lumia 930, which will be the highest specification phone launched by the company so far this year, will be priced around Rs 30,000 according to a distributor — about 20-40% cheaper than similar phones from other brands.
UPDATE :Nokia Lumia 930 has been launched in India at Rs 38,700.
Another distributor, however, said he expected the phone to be priced in the Rs 33,000-35,000 range. Lumia 930 is being sold for Rs 38,000 on eBay.
UPDATE: The sticker price of the device will be above Rs 36,000 and the initial online selling price would be in the range of Rs 33,000-35,000 (not 27,000-30,000 as reported earlier).
The company has also told distributors to get ready for the Lumia 830 launch within a matter of days.
The Lumia 930 comes with a 2.2 GHz Snapdragon 800 series chipset and a five-inch full HD AMOLED display. It will also have a 20 Megapixel camera.
In the Rs 26,000-30,000 range, it would difficult to get another phone with similar hardware. The Sony Xperia Z3, for example, is priced at Rs 50,000, despite very similar specifications. The closest would be the 2nd Generation Moto X launched two days ago (priced Rs 32,000).
In fact, the idea is to offer a similarly priced Windows Phone alternative to the Moto range, which has a reputation for offering the best hardware at the cheapest rate for Android customers.
The international price for the Nokia Lumia, with minimum level of taxes, is around $490, or about Rs 29,400, going by an Amazon listing. However, India’s taxes and duties of around 25-30% are higher than international rates where it is around 5-10% and should therefore normally imply a price of around Rs 35,000 here.
Besides, Lumia 925, the predecessor of the 930, was launched in August last year at Rs 33,500.
The cheaper of the two phones to be launched in the next few days, Lumia 830, will come with a Snapdragon 400 chipset and a 720p display.
Nokia desperately needs a refreshed phone in the upper-segment and the Lumia 930 will fit the profile very well with its full HD AMOLED display and 20 megapixel camera.
Nokia’s current high-end line-up comprises the Lumia 925, 1020, 1320 and 1520 — all of which were launched in 2013. In comparison, Sony has launched two iterations of its flagship high-end phone — the Xperia Z2 and Z3 — since February.
Another problem for Nokia has been the absence of 5-inch-plus full HD displays except the top-of-the-line Lumia 1520, which costs Rs 38,000.
The second highest-priced phone, the Lumia 925, still came with a 720p display despite costing Rs 25,000 — nearly double of what many full HD phones do.
Samsung, LG, Lenovo, Oppo, Motorola (which just launched the extremely-value-for-money Moto X 2) have been spoiling consumers with their latest and greatest.
Nokia, which still has a lot of consumer goodwill in India due to the sturdy nature of its phones, has not been able to take advantage of consumer goodwill due to lack of media buzz around launches, besides its obsession with the Windows Phone platform.
Still, the company offers decent deals in India from a hardware viewpoint – and is learnt to be working on very thin margins unlike brands like Sony, LG and Samsung.
However, in a market that is full of octa-core phones, Nokia’s current line-up has looked outdated with its dual-core powered “high end” models such as the Lumia 1320, 1020, 925.
Nokia, part of Microsoft Corp, has so far launched only entry-level and mid-range Lumia phones this year, including the entry-level Lumia 530 and Lumia 630. The models are priced in the Rs 5,500-9,000 ($90-$150) range.
A true mid-range phone, Nokia Lumia 730, is also planned, but there has been no information about when the phone will be launched in India so far.
As a result, it seems to be the Lumia 830 and 930 — the higher end versions, that are going to be launched first.
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