Nokia Mobile steps up the software game with ExpressVPN and Spotify partnerships

Alongside new devices, Nokia Mobile also announced new additions in their software offering. The Finns signed two partnerships with well known software companies in the fields of VPN and music. We are talking about ExpressVPN and Spotify.

The partnership with ExpressVPN, a virtual private network service that allows users the encrypt the traffic between their Nokia phones and sites they visit online, will be available for the Nokia G and X series of devices in selected countries, including “United Kingdom, Germany, Mexico, Poland, France, Finland, Netherlands, USA, Australia, Bulgaria, Romania, Italy, Czechia, Belgium, United Arab Emirates, Taiwan, Switzerland, Greece, Portugal, Hong Kong, Spain, Austria, Ireland, Sweden, Costa Rica, Denmark, New Zealand, Malaysia, Kuwait, Israel, Norway, Qatar, Estonia, Canada, Singapore, and Japan. The offer is a 30-day free trial of ExpressVPN.

The partnership with the Swedish streaming service Spotify will bring Spotify Free and Spotify Lite pre-installed to Nokia Android and Nokia Android Go devices from the X, C, and G series of phones.

While this shows a sign that Nokia Mobile is aware that software and some kind of differentiation through software is an import aspect of a smartphone, I feel that this might not be enough. A free month of ExpressVPN is nice, but having Spotify Free preloaded might be interpreted as bloatware. In any case, maybe this paves the way to better software deals with Nokia devices in the future.