In a recent move, Nokia reduced the price of its flagship Lumia phone by a whopping 50% and did it without grabbing too much attention. This process is quite normal with mobile phones, especially those that are being sold with a contract from a telephone provider. The price reduction in phones makes the devices available to a wider segment of the market and boosts sales after the craze for the new smartphone has died down. However, there appears to be another reason why Nokia slashed the price, which is the fact that Windows Phone 7 devices like the Lumia are not going to receive upgrades to the Windows Phone 8 OS, that is going to be released later this year.
The news about the Windows Phone 8 upgrade was considered pretty much a disaster for the Nokia Lumia lineup as it will be hard to convince people to buy a device that is going to be outdated in no more than a few months. The only consolation Nokia appears to be offering is that the phone will receive a Windows Phone 7.8 upgrade that will render the new start up screen and live tile interface.
While the reduced price of the phone is sure to tempt several people into buying it, those who are likely to make an informed decision about it will definitely shy away from the Lumia for the simple reason that waiting for a few months more will allow them to buy Windows 8 devices.
The key feature of the Windows 8 is that it will allow seamless integration between smartphones, tablets and PCs and anecdotal evidence from mobile phone carriers suggests that a lot of new resources are going to be riding on the Windows 8 platform. In addition, the inability of an upgrade option in the Windows 7 phones is going to put at least a minor dent in Nokia’s goodwill because of the millions it spent for research over the last couple of months.
Nokia has been desperate in its attempts to sell the Lumia line of phones and the launching of the Lumia 900 was evidence of that. Currently, the phones are reputed to have only exceeded expectations by a slight margin. The price cut can also possibly mean that both AT&T and Nokia are looking to get rid of the existing inventory and await the new Nokia phone with Windows 8 in the Spring.
