HMD Global

There was a time, during Google's big push towards the "Next Billion", when it was more aggressively pushing its Android Go "flavor" to both OEM partners and consumers. That push seems to have died down a little, as the market once more turned its attention to the high-end, the novel, and the expensive. Now along comes HMD Global and its mission to corner all the corners of the market on all tiers, announcing the Nokia C2 as the newest and so far the only new Android Go phone in the market.

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HMD Global has always prided itself on the vanilla Android experience it ships on its Nokia-branded phones. It has committed to sticking close to the Android One "flavor" on most of its models, shipping the trimmed down Android Go on a few of its most basic handsets. That said, its track record in actually pushing out those updates has been inconsistent at best and this news of further delays with the company's Android 10 update won't be doing it any favors in terms of public image.

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Everyone's going square or very large rectangles these days, at least as far as camera bumps on smartphones are concerned. Before that, however, Motorola introduced the world to a circular camera style, a legacy that HMD Global is apparently trying to continue. That design is coming to the manufacturer's mid-range Nokia and, for better or for worse, the Nokia 5.3 going to look like some other Nokia phones before it.

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HMD Global blazed into the smartphone scene with a promise to continue Nokia's legacy and do better by Android users than what most manufacturers give them. It did fulfill the former, mostly by flooding the market with affordable yet also underwhelming handsets that, at least for a while, seemed to also meet expectations of vanilla Android experiences that don't get updated all too often. With MWC 2020 approaching, the OEM is expected to unveil even more Nokia phones, including one that has a marvelous nickname it probably doesn't deserve.

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Android can be found almost anywhere these days, from your regular mobile devices to laptops to even home appliances. The one place it is somewhat ironically absent from is the so-called feature, or dumb, phones. Despite Google's best efforts, the platform may still be too incompatible with what many expect from such an entry-level communication device. HMD Global, however, might be daring to change that perception with what could be the world's first feature phone running Android and without a touch screen.

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What was once thought to be not only impossible but also infeasible is now starting to become the next big smartphone trend. Despite the costs, foldable devices or at least their prototypes are popping up left and right. The Motorola Razr and Samsung Galaxy Z Flip are just the opening salvo and 2020 might end seeing HMD Global launching its own take on the form factor. That despite the company's struggles in maintaining its business and launching its products.

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Cameras, 5G, and AI seem to be the pillars that the mobile market will stand on next year. Those features are, of course, always present in the premium and flagship phones that start at $600 or higher. Those with less constrained resources will naturally feel a bit left out but, fortunately for them, smartphone hardware is getting cheaper as well too. At least that seems to be what HMD Global is trying to sell with the Nokia 2.3, perhaps one of few if not first entry-level Android phones to claim AI-powered features, particularly in the camera.

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The Nokia 9 PureView may have remained a niche phone with its unusual five camera array, but HMD isn't giving up on the concept. Come 2020 the Android phone-maker will be launching a new Nokia PureView phone that uses Qualcomm's freshly-announced Snapdragon 765 chipset, and tapping its power for new camera features.

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Nokia, along with Motorola, was once one of the darlings of the mobile industry, back when smartphones were still the stuff of science fiction. The Finnish company made a few detours, including a brief stint at Microsoft, before finally licensing its name to HMD Global. For a time, the new Android Nokia phones seemed poised to reclaim their prestige but the interest around the affordable phones have seemingly trickled down. It is against that backdrop that the Nokia 8.2 may launch next week, perhaps a wake up call for HMD Global to pick up the slack.

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HMD Global may be earning accolades for its speed in rolling out updates to its Nokia phones (still not as fast as Essential, though) but it doesn't have a good reputation among some Android modders and hackers. In particular, Nokia phones are notorious for practically being useless as far as rooting and using ROMs are concerned because the bootloader gates are tightly locked. It seems, however, that the Nokia 7.2 might be the first of its kind to be different though it remains to be seen if it's by accident only or by intention.

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Google has always clarified that Android Go isn't a distinct version of Android but is just a special configuration, an "edition", designed for low-spec entry-level phones. Despite its lean nature, Android Go doesn't come with the same promise as the Android One program, leaving OEMs to style their experiences as they see fit or, worse, update them as they see fit. Distancing itself yet again from its peers, HMD Global is now promising it would be the first to roll out Android 10 Go Edition to its phones.

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It may seem that the days of the feature phones, a.k.a. the not so smart "dumbphones", are over but recent developments prove otherwise. They are just taking a different form and sometimes with new capabilities that take them one step closer to being extremely cheap and less capable smartphones. The recently announced KaiOS-powered Alcatel GO Flip 3 with Google Assistant is just one example and an Android-powered feature phone, probably made by Nokia, might be coming next.

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