Nokia

Nokia will bring more cheap Android phones to the US market, admits Android 11 rollout was a mess

Ben Schoon | Jan 5 2022 - 9:18 am PT

Nokia’s Android revival looked promising to start, but HMD’s rollout has seen some hiccups. As the company launches more Nokia-branded Android phones in the US, HMD is also owning up to the mess that was its Android 11 rollout.

HMD Global, the company behind Nokia-branded smartphones, is today announcing four new Android smartphones coming to the US this year. Arriving in the next few months, these new devices will all cost under $250.

The Nokia C100, C200, G100, and G400 are mainly 4G-only smartphones that range from $99 to $239. Starting from the bottom, the C100 will cost $99 and offer up a 5.45-inch display, 8MP rear camera, and a 3,000 mAh battery. It will launch sometime in Q1. Meanwhile, the C200 will cost $119 when it launches in Q2 with a 6.1-inch display and 4,000 mAh battery.

Stepping up, the Nokia G100 will cost $149 and will launch in Q2. It’ll have a 6.5-inch display, 5,000 mAh battery, and a fingerprint sensor in the power button. The Nokia G400 will come in at $239 and will be the only one with support for 5G networks. It also has a triple camera setup with a 48MP primary sensor, 5MP ultrawide, and 2MP macro. Its 6.6-inch display also has a 120Hz refresh rate. Rounding out the specs that Nokia has shared at this time, the Nokia G400 also has a 5,000 mAh battery, 6GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage.

Meanwhile, Nokia is also responding to its messy Android 11 rollout, which was plagued with delays and various other issues. Speaking to Android Authority, HMD’s Stephan Taylor said that Nokia learned from those mistakes and pointed to its stable rollout of Android 12 for the Nokia X20 as progress being made.

I think your observation is fair, to be honest. We did have not as much success with the Android 11 rollout [sic], and I think we’ve learned from that. But I think as we move forward, certainly on the global perspective, we’ve got a more focused level of device [sic], and we’re already in the beta program with Android 12. So yeah, bit humbled by how we did with Android 11, but I think we’ll get onto the front foot again.
HMD CMO Stephan Taylor