Meet the Ion Mini, an Android Jelly Bean running Nokia smartphone from 2013

Here is a blast from Nokia’s past. Evgeny Kozlov, a marketing director at Httpool Russia, posted on twitter a few photos of miniature Nokia smartphone that was running on Android 4.3 Jelly Bean. The year is 2013 and Nokia had a plan of launching Android phones if Windows Phone business goes south. The Android path was Plan B for saving the Phones & Services business. The only thing we saw was the Nokia X series that run ASOP version of Android in 2014, and later Nokia N1 tablet that turned out to be a test platform for the return of Nokia brand back to the smartphone business.

Anyway, the code name of this Nokia smartphone was, actually still is, Ion Mini. The design of this proto device was based on Nokia N9, as it was for many Nokia phones back then (Lumia 800, 900, 920…), but even today some elements can be found in new Nokia smartphones. Nokia chose Snapdragon 400 for this model, which was usually placed in midrange phones in 2013. The small body of the phone didn’t house a big display, but it could have been bigger if there wasn’t a huge speaker at the bottom. Or at least I think that the black plastic part is a speaker.

Interestingly, Nokia incorporated Z Launcher in it which I think would look good at new Nokia phones also, or at least would make the current lineup differ at the market.

As always, I’m wondering what else was Nokia developing and who knows how many interesting devices are lying locked in some drawers.

 

Source

https://twitter.com/ekozlov/status/1127482298952245248