Rumors: #Nokia 8 might come to India in October

NPU reports, that an HMD executive told them that the newly announced Nokia 8 flagship will probably be available by Mid-October in India. When HMD announced the 8 last month, early September was put as a release date for the device. We already saw that different stores across Europe and in Australia started taking pre-orders for the device, with delivery in early September, as HMD said.

HMD seems to be well aware that they are not capable to sell the device in all expected markets at day one, but will use a more traditional and smarter move to bring the device in more developed and loyal to Nokia markets first. That market consists of Nordic countries, developed parts of Europe, Russia and Australia. China and the US should receive an “improved” variant of Nokia 8 (probably with more RAM) later, but there is no detailed info for India, that is a high-priority market for HMD, apart from the statement given to NPU.

In India, the problem could be local manufacturing. It is not known, but I guess that HMD will manufacture the Nokia 8 locally for the Indian market, and considering that they still have to deliver the Nokia 6 (sales expected tomorrow) it could be that Nokia 8 manufacturing for India is running slower compared to the “global” on in China.  In  mid-July, we heard rumors that HMD already started manufacturing the Nokia 8 in China, and it seems that the first batch of devices will not hit China, India, a lot of markets in Asia, just like the US.

I am not sure about the local manufacturing thing, but it could be the reason for later sales start in India compared to Europe. It could also be that HMD (FIH) cannot manufacture enough units and they will first target country where more flagship devices are sold, compared to other categories.

If this info is true, October isn’t that far away. It will be roughly 2 months after the announcement, which is not bad, or may I say excellent considering what happened with 3, 5 and 6.