So the Nokia N97 was a bit of a disaster. Normally, companies pretend that all of their products are great, even when they aren’t. But one Nokia VP is willing to admit that the N97 was a steamer.
Nokia’s VP of Markets Anssi Vanjoki recently said in an interview that the N97 was a “tremendous disappointment in terms of the experience quality for the consumers and something [they]did not anticipate”. How refreshingly candid!
Of course, he’s using such candidness as an excuse to claim that they’ve learned their lesson and are working to make the N97 a real contender via firmware updates. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that it might be a little late for firmware to save the N97, but if Nokia really is learning from its mistakes, bring on the next gen devices. If Microsoft can retool its mobile division after the abortion that was WinMo 6.5, there’s no reason Nokia can’t do the same. [All About Symbian via Engadget]
Colin Richardson
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 at 8:58 AMI can tell you as a very dissapointed N97 owner, the software updates will have to be good for me to even considering buying another Nokia of any type! And don’t even get me started on that stupid and useless “OVI Suite”!
Michael Harris
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 at 10:33 PMThe problem is the s/w updates referred to in the video was v20/21. God help us if v30 isn’t in the pipe otherwise us N97 owners are screwed.
Anonymous
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 at 10:55 AMOh man.
But we all KNEW N97 was crap the moment we saw it. It had a whole bunch of feature points but looking at it and the interface told everything we wanted to know.
That VP and others involved in its design have no idea what people want. What do they want? Look at iPhone and WM7.
Steve
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 at 8:15 PMThis was a phone that I went out on a limb to get – using the trust I had built up over many years of using Nokias. Now, that trust is shattered, and now bloody update with kinetic scrolling is gonna bring that back.
I went N97 to stay away from Apple – looks like it’s got to tide me over until the WM7 comes to Australian shores. Woot for staying off the bandwagon! But at what cost?!
Mike Biggs
Friday, February 26, 2010 at 12:42 PMMy wife works for Vodafone, and ordered an N97 as her insurance replacement after destroying her N95. She wanted an N97 just because it wasn’t an iPhone, and wanted something similar, still different. A months of updates, issues, and tears later, she is severely unimpressed. I swapped her for my iPhone for a day, only to find the Nokia morbidly slow, dull and unuser friendly; and I work in IT, I’m used to crap hardware. Her contract is up, and she’s ordered a 3GS. The N97 lost all the benefits usually associated with owning a Nokia, specifically something like an N95, and gained nothing in return. Slow, unsupported, clunky… list goes on. I’m no Jobs-fanboy, but his phones really work a treat. other manufacturers will have to try a lot harder if they want to be on par with a force like the iPhone. Half-efforts like the N97 will only hurt them in the long run. Nokia: 0, Fruit-based-brand: 21,000,000 & counting.
ravi
Monday, March 22, 2010 at 8:10 PMsay no to nokia becaz even nokia ceo admitted that n97 and mini both are utterly useless with outdated platforms there must be an exchange program for all n97 oweners with future releasing flagship mobiles unless nobody thinks of nokia atleast just sorry will not make those unhappy owners