Business Standard

Nokia gets 35,000 app ideas from users

Most of the apps are related to women safety, health, car pooling and tracking girlfriends

Katya Naidu Mumbai
Handset maker Nokia launched a rare democratic initiative  to add more applications on their Windows' smartphone platform.

They sought consumers to send in ideas of mobile applications across entertainment, finance and other social utilities. The company claims that this initiative called 'Your wish is my app' created a lot of enthusiasm .

“The response has been outstanding. We have received for 35,000 app ideas in just about four weeks which in itself is a huge achievement and clearly demonstrates consumer’s enthusiasm for such initiatives,” said Gerard Rego, director of developer experience at Nokia India.

But what kind of apps do users want? Nokia says that many of them are looking for a seamless app that can manage all other technologies, similar to a universal remote. The other usual ones related to women safety, health, car pooling and tracking girlfriends.     

The company joined hands with NDTV to host a reality TV show where celebrity judges which includes a mix of actors to chefs. The judges are actor-Kalki Koechlin; NDTV Managing Editor-Rajiv Makhni; Managing Director of DisneyUTV Digital-Vishal Gondal, and Venture Capitalist & Co-Founder, Harvard Business School Alumni Angels- Raj Chinai, chef-Vikas Khanna.

The show will select short-listed apps and the winning apps would be featured on the Windows platform. The Windows platform for smartphones has been made popular by Nokia Lumia handsets in India.

Nokia as well as Windows are late entrants into the smartphone category which is being dominated by American company Apple and Samsung from South Korea. Both the plaforms used by these phones namely iOS and Android have an extensive apps. While iOS has over one lakh apps,  Andrioid has two lakhs.

“The whole idea behind this campaign was to give consumers what they want. We believe that applications not only add to the device capabilities, but also give each consumer the opportunity to personalise their mobile devices to their needs and preference,” said Rego.

Don't miss the most important news and views of the day. Get them on our Telegram channel

First Published: Feb 15 2013 | 5:30 PM IST

Explore News