Nokia E90 First Smartphone with BlackBerry Connect 4.0

Nokia E90 First Smartphone with BlackBerry Connect 4.0


Nokia E90 First Smartphone with BlackBerry Connect 4.0
By James Alan Miller
March 27, 2007


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During the Smartphone Summit yesterday, a day-long fiesta of seminars devoted to all things smartphones just ahead of the CTIA Wireless show in Orlando, Vincent Washington, a Business Development Manager at Research In Motion (RIM) revealed Nokia's upcoming E90 Communicator will be the first device to support BlackBerry Connect 4.0, a major upgrade over the current version.
The BlackBerry Connect program enables the mob-e-mail leader's push e-mail and data access solutions to work with non-Blackberry devices. BlackBerry Connect 4.0 adds the ability to generate an encryption key wirelessly, wireless activation of a device in the enterprise, AES in addition to Triple Data Encryption Standard (DES), Dutch and Brazilian Portuguese language support, and the ablity to erase and disable a BlackBerry-enabled device

So for corporate customers BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) software tightly integrates with Microsoft Exchange, IBM Lotus Domino and existing enterprise systems to enable secure access to e-mail and other corporate data. This includes the automatic synchronization of messages to the E90's inbox, calendar syncing, attachment viewing, Triple DES encryption, Remote Address Lookup of corporate directory, and centralized device management, with support for IT policies such as over-the-air device disablement and password device lock.

And, as with individuals and small businesses with BlackBerry handhelds, BlackBerry Connect will enable E90 users to access ISP e-mail accounts through the hosted BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS).

More on the E90
Nokia resurrects its long-running communicator line with the E90, which is now a part of the business-centric Eseries.

While the E90 is a Symbian smartphone like past communicators, Nokia ditches the S80 interface for the far more popular S60 platform with this device. This means, among other things, a far larger swath of third-party software will be available to E90 owners than the 9500, for example.

The E90 measures 5.2 x 2.2 x 0.8 inches (132 x 57 x 20 millimeters) and weighs 7.4 ounces (210 grams).

As a quad-band GSM (850/900/1800/1900) device, the E90 will pretty much get you a signal almost anywhere in the world. There's also GPRS, 2.5G EDGE, 3G UMTS and 3.5G HSPDA data networking supported. Additional wireless technologies include Wi-Fi, Bluetooth with stereo headset support, GPS and even an FM radio.

There's a full keypad along with a 240 x 320 pixel resolution display that you can run software from on the outside - so you can use nearly all the E90's functions with the smartphone closed (unlike previous Nokia communicators), and a full QWERTY thumb-keyboard with a large 800 x 352 pixel resolution screen that supports 16 million colors inside.



The E90 has two cameras, a 3.2 megapixel one with autofocus and flash and a second shooter for video conferencing. It features stereo speakers and a 2.5 mm connector for stereo headphones. There's a microSD slot to add additional storage on top of the device's built-in 128 MB of RAM: It ships with a 512 MB microSD card, which format that is now available up to 2 GB in size. The E90 sports a USB Mini-B connector to link to a PC at USB 2.0 speeds.

It includes a text-to-speech reader, the Quickoffice document editor/reader, many personal information management tools, the new Nokia Maps application, a MP3 and AAC audio player, an video player, and a full compliment of messaging and e-mail options.

Nokia estimates the E90 will start shipping during the second quarter of this year, and become available globally during the third. The unsubsidized retail price should be around 750 to 800 Euros, which is in the $1,000 range.



Related Links:


T-Mobile BlackBerry Connects Samsung T719
Cingular BlackBerry Connects Treo 650
RIM BlackBerry Connects SE M600i
Cingular BlackBerry Connects Nokia 9300
PalmSource, RIM Connect Mobile Platforms


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Blackberry Curve sponsor John Mayer summer Tour

We spent some time with John Mayer as he prepared for his tour. We've got exclusive photos and a video interview with John talking about his plans for the tour.Notice the curve in his hand
In a first for both sponsor and sponsoree, BlackBerry will present John Mayer`s upcoming North American tour, Billboard has learned. Portable communication device BlackBerry will use the Mayer tour to help launch its upcoming AT&T-carried mobile phone, Curve.


The 40-date BlackBerry Presents John Mayer in Concert tour begins June 1 in Ridgefield, Wash., with Ben Folds supporting. Live Nation is promoting the majority of dates on the tour and reports that sales are strong in the early going.


Paul Kalbfleisch, senior director of corporate marketing for BlackBerry parent Research in Motion (RIM), says recent additions to the BlackBerry product line such as Pearl and the new Curve make live music a viable avenue to reach consumers in search of devices with plenty of capabilities.


"John Mayer`s concert tour gives us that venue and that context to talk about BlackBerry to a group of people that maybe we haven`t talked to before, and to make them think about how BlackBerry fits into their whole life, not just their work life," Kalbfleisch says.


Mayer`s demo fits the BlackBerry target, Kalbfleisch adds. "We`re able to reach out to a new audience, maybe a slightly younger audience in their 20s, without at all alienating the existing BlackBerry audience," he says.


In activating the campaign, BlackBerry will launch a site highlighting the tour and the company`s relationship with Mayer. Marketing in traditional and new media are part of the promotion, as is an on-site presence at concert venues. Consumer-interactive contests are being finalized, and BlackBerry will host VIP parties and backstage meet-and-greets at shows.


"On-site during every concert we`ll have the ability to showcase and demonstrate BlackBerry Curve, along with our carrier partner AT&T, so that people coming to the concerts will see, touch and feel our product, learn what it has to offer them, take pictures with it, have a little bit of fun with it," Kalbfleisch says. "We will have the ability to interact with the audience without interfering with the concert itself."


Live event sponsorship, particularly music events, has experienced huge growth in the past few years as marketers struggle to reach consumers in an efficient way. So why is BlackBerry just now getting into the tour sponsorship game?


"The product offering and our strategy had to be in line with reaching out to this type of audience," says Kalbfleisch, who says the BlackBerry reach is now broad and the brand more mainstream than it was only a few years ago. "The entertainment world and more unique opportunities started to make sense to us now. Two years ago it probably wasn`t time yet."