Amongst all of the rivalry between the Apple iPhone and RIM Blackberry Phones, very few are paying attention to Nokia. The name should sound familiar, but where have they been? Nokia is finding excitement and success in the glamorous and innovative. At this point, everyone who’s anyone has some style of smart phone. It’s almost difficult to find a phone that is just a phone anymore.

Nokia’s engineers are designing futuristic prototypes that they feel will either be the next exciting wave of personal electronic devices, or a unreasonably expensive gift to answer the age-old question, “What do you get for the man who has everything?”

We’ll get to Nokia’s sleek new designs in a second, but let’s start off by discussing their front-runner product–the elusive and exclusive Vertu. Varying in styles and price ranges, the Vertu starts at around $2500-$5000 and tops off at an exclusive 5-off phone made with diamonds, gold, and rubies for…around $350,000.

Is Nokia’s head in the right place, or do Blackberry and iPhone drastically outpace them financially?

Nokia is prepared to officially announce its next step: cheap cell phones directly marketed toward certain targets. This is the CXENS system which would label phones with one of these letters depending on the type of device it is. So…

C=Voice-centric handsets

X=youth-targeted, entertainment

E=business focused

N=high end

S=limited editions

The new phones are expected to be high definition touch screen with a 12MP camera–and the phones targeted to a much younger audience may even be sold as low as $60.

As promised, I’ll leave you with some insane new concept designs by the fine innovators (and mad scientists) over at Nokia. Enjoy!

Sources: Tom’s Guide (article in french) |