Nokia and Oracle seals mapping deal.

WorldWide Tech & Science. Francisco De Jesùs.

Nokia and Oracle seals mapping deal.

Struggling Finnish vendor Nokia has struck a deal that will give Oracle’s customers access to its growing vault of map data and location services.

The Wall Street Journal claims the partnership could be announced later today in San Francisco at the OracleWorld conference.

The move will come as a boost to Nokia, as it looks for ways to strengthen the business. The quality of its map services are held in high regard throughout the industry and it has recently signed mapping deals with Groupon and Amazon. In 2008 Nokia acquired the world’s largest digital mapping firm Navteq.  In stark contrast with Nokia's troubled phone business, sales at Nokia's location business grew last quarter, although it still generates only 4 percent of group revenue.

The high-profile deal also comes as major rival Apple struggles with the launch of its own mapping services on the new iOS 6 platform.

Meanwhile Oracle is the world's third-biggest software firm but also sells hardware to corporate clients and in 2009 bought Sun Microsystems, the manufacturer of server computers and developer of Java and Solaris software. Oracle will tout the deal as an easy way for customers to use Nokia's maps to integrate consistent and broad mapping capabilities into Oracle applications.

Nokia to launch the Lumia 920 and 820 in Italy, Russia and Germany. Prices and carriers.

WorldWide Tech & Science. Francisco De Jesùs.

Nokia to launch the Lumia 920 and 820 in Italy, Russia and Germany. Prices and carriers.

Italy:

Nokia has announced its first carrier deals to launch the new Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 smartphones. A statement from Nokia Italy said the Windows phones will be available from mid-November with all four operators in Italy (Telecom Italia, 3 Italia, Vodafone Italia and Wind). The Lumia 920 is priced at EUR 599 including VAT, and the 820 will cost EUR 499 without a contract.

Russia:

Nokia plans to start sales of its Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 smartphones in Russia in the fourth quarter, reports RIA Novosti. A statement from Nokia Russia said that the Lumia 920 will cost RUB 24,990, and the Lumia 820 is priced at RUB 19,990. Pre-orders for the Windows phones have already started.

Germany:

Nokia has confirmed that the Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 Windows Phone 8 smartphones will be available in Germany from start-November. Vodafone Germany and Mobilcom-debitel will sell both models, with O2 Germany and Deutsche Telekom offering the Lumia 820. At launch, the phones will be available in yellow, red, white and black. 

All smartphones brands with NFC differentiate their products, where iPhone 5 lacks.

WorldWide Tech & Science. Francisco De Jesùs.

All smartphones brands with NFC differentiate their products, where iPhone 5 lacks.

Although Apple's iPhone 5 is expected to enjoy strong sales, the lack of NFC (near field communication) functionality in the latest iPhone model will allow rival brands to differentiate their products and to become priority partners for launching NFC-enabled applications and services in cooperation with financial and telecom service companies, according to industry sources.

Most industry watchers believe that the reason Apple rolled out the iPhone 5 without built-in NFC functionality is that Apple aims to promote its in-house developed Passbook technology, which has already integrated a number of functionalities, including the processing of boarding passes, membership cards, tickets, value-stored cards, and various kinds of coupons, but not yet credit and debit cards.

Since a number of smartphone platforms, including Android, BlackBerry, Symbian and Bada as well as the forthcoming Windows Phone 8, all support NFC technology, financial firms, telecom carriers and advertisement agencies, among others, are likely to tie up with non-iPhone vendors to launch NFC-enabled services, said the sources.

Samsung Electronics has won the largest number of NFC-related cooperation projects in Europe and Asia, while RIM, HTC, LG Electronics and Nokia have also engaged in a number of cases, revealed the sources, noting that RIM has led rivals in establishing ties with the business sector for NFC applications.

HTC has recently launched three NFC-enabled models, the HTC Desire C, One XC and One X (16G-version), in cooperation with China Merchants Bank, supporting electronic wallet functionality launched by China UnionPay as well as payment systems of China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, the sources commented.