AT&T has confirmed that it is in negotiations to carry Nokia’s new line of Windows Phone handsets in the US market, starting in 2012, reports Bloomberg Businessweek. Nokia, whose Lumia 710 and Lumia 800 devices (pictured above) are currently available in a number of European countries, is pushing hard to compete against the likes of Apple’s iPhone and the plethora of Android-based handsets that currently dominate the smartphone market.
“We look at every promotional period separately and decide what we’re going to spend our dollars on and what we’re going to put our efforts in,” said Glenn Lurie, AT&T’s head of tablets, during a conference in Barcelona. “But nothing to announce there on that yet.”
According to WinRumors, Nokia is expected to debut its Windows Phone devices at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which takes place in January. Microsoft is said to be putting its full weight behind the push at CES to help Nokia compete in the US market.
The Lumia 710 and Lumia 800 run on Microsoft’s new Windows Phone 7.5 “Mango” operating system. The devices have so far been met with a positive reception from critics. According to a recent interview with Paul Amsellem, head of Nokia France, Nokia has plans to release both a higher-end Lumia (tentatively dubbed the Lumia 900), as well as a less expensive model. In addition, the company also plans to release a tablet that runs Microsoft’s Windows 8 OS in mid-2012.
Adding to Amsellem’s statement, a Nokia developer video, which hit the Internet yesterday, appears to show the Lumia 900 (or whatever it will be called), giving us a glimpse of what the device might look like.
As we’ve said before, we are cautiously optimistic about Nokia’s new handset lineup, and Windows Phone Mango devices in general. So any steps towards making them available in the US is a good thing. We just hope AT&T can speed up its rollout of its LTE network, so we’re not stuck with the sub-par HSPA+ connections that make up the bulk of the carrier’s wireless offerings.
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