The ToyBox

Ricardo Bilton & Gloria Sin
Home / News & Blogs / The ToyBox

Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers

By | February 18, 2011, 5:48am PST

Summary: Even though the e7 smartphone isn’t even available outside of Europe just yet, Nokia is handing out units of that smartphone and of the Nokia WP7 device to developers - for free!

Even though the e7 smartphone isn’t even available outside of Europe just yet, Nokia is handing out units of that smartphone and of the Nokia WP7 device to developers - for free!

According to SlashGear, the generous move is not only to appease developers who were upset over the loss of Symbian to Windows Phone 7, but also so they can get accustomed to Launchpad, Nokia’s mobile app development program.

A letter to Launchpad members also leaked from an anonymous tipster, which cites the following freebies:

We are also excited to offer you one free admission to the next Nokia World/Nokia Developer Summit later this year. We will take care of the registration costs.

To assist you with your development activities in the near-term, we will ship one free Nokia E7 device to all program members. Additionally, we will send to you one free Nokia WP7 device, as soon as it becomes available.

To accelerate your mobile app development, we will provide free tech support on all Nokia technologies for the next three months (up to 10 tickets). Equally, if you would like to take advantage of a free User Experience evaluation of one of your apps, please let us know and we will work with you to make those arrangements.

As nice as free smartphones and tech support sessions are, Nokia’s gifts still might not please all developers - or shareholders after a revolt that may or may not have happened. Nevertheless, it’s time to move on and just accept the new way of doing things (and accept all of those fun prizes).

Hopefully all of this means we’ll not only see the e7 in North America soon, but also the first joint Nokia-Microsoft mobile device too.

Related coverage on ZDNet:

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily e-mail newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

More from “The ToyBox”

Topics

Nokia Corp., Rachel King

Rachel King is a staff writer for ZDNet based in San Francisco.

Disclosure

Rachel King

Rachel King has no business relationships, affiliations, investments, or other potential conflicts of interest relating to the content posted in this blog.

Biography

Rachel King

Rachel King is a staff writer for CBS Interactive in San Francisco. Before serving as a contributing editor at ZDNet in New York City for two years, she previously worked for The Business Insider, FastCompany.com, CNN's San Francisco bureau and the U.S. Department of State. Rachel has also written for MainStreet.com, Irish America Magazine and the New York Daily News, among others. Rachel has a B.A. in Mass Communications and History from the University of California, Berkeley and a M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University, where she served as art director for the student magazine, Plated.

11
Comments
Add Your Opinion

Join the conversation!

Just In

RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Greenocean 20th Feb 2011
@John Zern Nokia should have been doing this even before RIM, Apple, and Google eroded Nokia's market share. But a Win 7 OS??
View in thread
0 Votes
+ -
Google did the same thing
John Zern 18th Feb 2011
so I think its a great way to get developers to use the product they're developing for as opposed to having to buy one.
Though it's an interesting thought: How many Android and iPhone sales are attributed to developers purchasing a phone so as to test their apps?
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Rick_K 18th Feb 2011
@John Zern
How many Android and iPhone sales are attributed to developers purchasing a phone so as to test their apps?
I think it has relatively little impact, as both systems (I believe) have software emulators. Granted it is not as nice as an actual device. Now you have to ask this: How many Windows phone 7 series OS developers, bought a Windows phone 7 series phone? If there are 27,000 developers and 90,000 Microsoft employees that would make up 117,000 Windows phone 7 series phones. Even if they managed to get 2 million into the hands of customers, you?d have to deduct between 27,000 and 117,000 as they are for testing or internal use.
0 Votes
+ -
Why would I have to ask that?
John Zern 18th Feb 2011
I was wondering the impact of those in the past, not going forward.
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Rick_K 18th Feb 2011
@John Zern
Good point, but at this juncture there have been so many sold that developers buying a phone would have little impact on overall sales.
0 Votes
+ -
Agreed, Rick_K
John Zern 18th Feb 2011
@Rick_K
but at this juncture there have been so many sold that developers buying a phone would have little impact on overall sales

That's probally true. And they probally do use the phones themselves.
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Greenocean 20th Feb 2011
@John Zern Nokia should have been doing this even before RIM, Apple, and Google eroded Nokia's market share. But a Win 7 OS??
0 Votes
+ -
Wildfire2
guihombre 18th Feb 2011
Looking at the current landscape, I reckon the HTC Wildfire 2 will this years big seller.

E7 could have succeeded at the high end, but not with Nokia deprecating its OS.

WP7... unlikely, even if they add the cut/paste multitasking / data leak fix etc...

iPhone nano, vapourware.
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Rick_K Updated - 18th Feb 2011
@guihombre
iPhone nano, vapourware
Not Vapourware, speculation. Apple has not hinted that this product is coming, nor have they announced one. Vapourware is when the company announces a product to freeze the market. Kind of like the Windows 8 tablets that are being announced, for late next year. The talk about the iPhone Nano is strictly a news group trying to get attention, and maybe more subscriptions to their paper.
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Rama.NET 18th Feb 2011
@Rick_K
Got it. If someone talks about a product from Microsoft, it is vaporware and if someone talks about product from apple in future, it is mere speculation. Got it.
0 Votes
+ -
RE: Nokia handing out free e7 and WP7 smartphones to developers
Rick_K 18th Feb 2011
@Rama.NET
No Mr.Microsoft, that is not the way it goes. When a company talks about a product, trying to generate hype over a distant product, that is vaporware. When a news group is hyping speculation that is another story. I have not heard of Apple announcing a product that will not be released for over a year (like the Hp Windows 8 tablet). But I am sure you want to apply a different standard to what Apple does. One question: Who made the announcement of the iphone Nano? Was it Apple? No. That makes it speculation, not vaporware.
0 Votes
+ -
guihombre, another "honest" assesment?
John Zern 18th Feb 2011
@guihombre
happy

Join the conversation!

Formatting +
BB Codes - Note: HTML is not supported in forums
  • [b] Bold [/b]
  • [i] Italic [/i]
  • [u] Underline [/u]
  • [s] Strikethrough [/s]
  • [q] "Quote" [/q]
  • [ol][*] 1. Ordered List [/ol]
  • [ul][*] · Unordered List [/ul]
  • [pre] Preformat [/pre]
  • [quote] "Blockquote" [/quote]
ie8 fix

The best of ZDNet, delivered

ZDNet Newsletters

Get the best of ZDNet delivered straight to your inbox

Facebook Activity

Blog Roll

Blog Archive

White Papers, Webcasts, & Resources
ie8 fix