Nokia sells 1.5 billion phones with their own OS S40

Since 1999, Nokia’s 1.5 billion phones running its own operating system S40 sold. The OS is running especially on cheaper phones of the Finnish manufacturer. The future of the operating system, however, is very uncertain.

Of that 1.5 billion mobile phones, there are still 675 million in use, says Nokia told the BBC. S40 is the platform that Nokia uses for cheap mobiles; the most expensive S40 phone currently costs 194 euro, but many models are cheaper than 100 euro. On S40 can Java-apps. Last year was support for touch screens on S40 added. Nokia uses its own platform since 1999. How many models since then with the S40 were published, is unclear. Presumably it’s only been in the Netherlands for a few hundreds of models.

The future of the platform is unclear. Nokia would be behind the scenes are busy with Meltemi, which is a further development of Maemo and MeeGo. So would the cheap phones the same Swipe-interface as the Nokia N9. In addition, it bought the Finnish manufacturer last year, an os for cheap phones.

Nokia sold the anderhalfmiljardste phone with S40 in Brazil to a 21-year-old lady, so states a press release. The lady is presumably chosen for promotional reasons, but the choice seems somewhat unfortunate; her name, Mayara Rodrigues, is the same as that of a Brazilian porn star.