Carphone Warehouse will become the world's first virtual 3G network operator when it begins selling the 3G Nokia 7600 handset next month, the company announced on Thursday.
Buyers of the 7600 will get access to the 3G network of 3 UK, a unit of Hutchison Whampoa, but will not have access to certain of 3's premium services. All support will be carried out by Carphone Warehouse, which will sell the handset exclusively through its 500-plus shops throughout the UK.
The companies arrived at the deal because of a controversial feature, or rather lack thereof, of the 7600: it does not support video calling, one of the main services hawked by 3. Discussing the 7600 last month, Nokia explained that it does not see video calling as a popular service this year, simply because videophone owners will have no one else to call. In the near term Nokia is focusing on multimedia content such as videos, music and images, the company said.
That position is at odds with the strategy of 3, which has the UK's only functioning 3G network so far, and is hoping to encourage the spread of video-call-enabled handsets, paving the way for video-calling services to eventually take off. Nokia is the mobile phone market leader, accounting for more than a third of all handsets sold worldwide, and its decisions carry considerable weight in the market.
Nokia 7600 users will have access to 3's network and to some data services, such as news bulletins, comedy programming and horoscopes, but will not be able to access premium services such as Premier League and MTV video clips.
The 7600 has an unusual teardrop shape, and measures 87mm x 78mm x 18.6mm, weighing 123g with battery. It can download or stream multimedia content and includes a camera and video recorder. The dual-mode GSM/WCDMA handset has a 128x160 pixel, 65,536-colour display.
3 sells handsets made by NEC and Motorola. At least three of the UK's biggest network operators, O2, Orange, Vodafone and T-Mobile, are planning 3G launches this year.
In a related announcement on Thursday, Nokia launched its 6620 handset, the first to support EDGE data networks, designed to be a step up from GPRS. The 6620, designed for the Americas market, is the first EDGE-based handset to use the Symbian operating system for smartphones.
Talkback
Serious problems with 3G calls. Video calls too expensive: i won't pay over twice the price to see someone while talking to them when voice only is more than sufficent. also, network coverage is crap. i'm from NE England. Newcastle is covered but the only areas between here and scotland run the route following the A1. so i can only call friends if they are within 2 miles or driving up the A1 at the time i call. people don't need video calling, they need cheaper voice calls!
Well that should fall in line with my experience of CarPhone warehouse. I purchased two Motorola phones over Xmas from their Milton Keynes branch. Both phones were camera ready. They sold me two Virgin Mobile accounts to go with the phones. After problems with both my kids trying to send picture messages I phoned Virgin only to find out that Virgin will not be supporting this technology until the Spring of 2004!! So it's a case of CW selling anything like like irrespective of whther it actually works or not!
Calling 3 a 'functioning network' is a somewhat wild stretch of the imagination. I bought 2 video handsets in April 2003, one for myself and one for my wife, and despite both of us living and working in central London we have as yet been unable to successfully connect a single video call.
Personally I hope they go bankrupt before they rip off too many more unsuspecting customers.