Nokia XR21 5G, Nokia 110 4G (2023), and more phones certified in India
Last month, HMD Global or Nokia Mobile shuffled things in its India business as the operations in the country are now headed by Ravi Kunwar. On the other hand, the exports from the country are still being looked after by Sanmeet Singh Kochhar. What changes will this switch in leadership bring? That remains to be seen, but one thing has already improved starting this year.
The launch prices of the new generation Nokia C-series phones have come down compared to the previous ones. Even the Nokia X30 5G, launched at a price more than the global average, underwent a price reduction of 25% within two months of launch, making it somewhat considerable. In other news, the new Nokia 106 4G and Nokia 105 (2023) were launched with built-in support for UPI (Unified Payments Interface) payments in the country.
Now, Nokia Mobile seems to be preparing to launch at least four more feature phones, namely, Nokia 110 4G (2023) [TA-1556], Nokia 110 (2023) [TA-1565, TA-1568], Nokia 106 (2023) [TA-1561, TA-1572, TA-1578, TA-1579], and an unannounced 4G feature phone with the model numbers TA-1576 and TA-1582, in India. The devices have been certified by BIS (Bureau of Indian Standards), with Padget as the manufacturer.
Bharat FIH not manufacturing those devices hints that FIH Mobile is not the ODM here.
Accompanying those feature phones will be the new Nokia XR21. As per BIS, Sichuan Doov, which produced the Nokia X30 5G, is also manufacturing the Nokia XR21 (TA-1486). All eyes will be on its pricing when it finally launches in India. Nokia XR20 and Nokia X30 5G launched with a price above ₹45k.
The Nokia XR21 will continue Nokia Mobile’s streak of importing all its 5G smartphones from China to India. One would usually find Nokia Mobile boasting about manufacturing most of its phones for the Indian market in India, which is correct for feature phones and 4G smartphones, but not when it comes to 5G smartphones. Even the tablets are being imported, except for the Nokia T10, which now has its third manufacturer registered on BIS in the form of Dixon (owner of Padget).
