MUMBAI: Nokia plans to launch its music service ‘Comes With Music’ in India by the end of this year. The service aims to give consumers unlimited music downloads from the soon to be formally launched Nokia Music Store for a year.

Nokia's Music Store, on the verge of an official launch in the country, will enable consumers to browse, download and sync music either to their computer or directly on to the mobile device. The India store will offer over a million tracks from both international labels and local partnerships, says Nokia India marketing director Vineet Taneja.

India is amongst the fastest growing mobile markets in the world today adding approximately ten million new subscribers every month.  For Nokia, India is the second largest market globally and hence an extremely important and strategic market for its business. "We have kept ahead of the market as our strategy is to offer the most comprehensive product portfolio, to establish a strong experience-driven retail network, and to focus on customer centric innovation across all segments," says Taneja. 

India has shipped close to 85 million mobile handsets between April 2007 and March 2008, compared to under 66 million units shipped in the previous fiscal, registering an year-on-year growth of around 29 per cent, he says.  In the last quarter of the financial year FY 2008, country's shipment has touched 22.3 million which amounts to around 10,000 phones every hour (IDC). Also mobile phone production revenue is expected to reach $13.6 billion by 2011 a CAGR of 26.6 percent. (Source: Gartner)

Nokia is one of the few players in the industry that offers two unique music sub-brands ‘XpressMusic’ targeted primarily at the youth at an affordable price point and Nseries - multimedia devices that have a special music edition.  Today Nokia has over six XpressMusic devices including Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, a touch device with human interface, Nokia 5310 XpressMusic, and Nokia 5130 the most affordable ‘XpressMusic’ device  amongst others.

As for mobile music, the feature will continue to be a key priority area for Nokia in 2009. With more than 425 million music-enabled mobile devices and more than 700 million devices with an FM radio sold till date makes Nokia the world’s largest manufacturer of music-enabled mobile devices, says Taneja. The company's Music Store is currently live in 15 markets globally, which has helped Nokia to gain insights on what people want in a music device and track important trends on how people consume music, he adds. 

The company has tied up with a host of leading major independent Indian record labels including Tseries, Big Music, Eros, Venus and Yashraj, as also with the Indian Music Industry (IMI), a consortium of over 150 music companies. Nokia also has tie ups with international music labels like Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, EMI and Warner.

Nokia currently has over 15 entry devices that range from Rs 1300/- to Rs 5000/- which include FM Radio.

MUMBAI: Nokia plans to launch its music service ‘Comes With Music’ in India by the end of this year. The service aims to give consumers unlimited music downloads from the soon to be formally launched Nokia Music Store for a year.

Nokia's Music Store, on the verge of an official launch in the country, will enable consumers to browse, download and sync music either to their computer or directly on to the mobile device. The India store will offer over a million tracks from both international labels and local partnerships, says Nokia India marketing director Vineet Taneja.

India is amongst the fastest growing mobile markets in the world today adding approximately ten million new subscribers every month.  For Nokia, India is the second largest market globally and hence an extremely important and strategic market for its business. "We have kept ahead of the market as our strategy is to offer the most comprehensive product portfolio, to establish a strong experience-driven retail network, and to focus on customer centric innovation across all segments," says Taneja. 

India has shipped close to 85 million mobile handsets between April 2007 and March 2008, compared to under 66 million units shipped in the previous fiscal, registering an year-on-year growth of around 29 per cent, he says.  In the last quarter of the financial year FY 2008, country's shipment has touched 22.3 million which amounts to around 10,000 phones every hour (IDC). Also mobile phone production revenue is expected to reach $13.6 billion by 2011 a CAGR of 26.6 percent. (Source: Gartner)

Nokia is one of the few players in the industry that offers two unique music sub-brands ‘XpressMusic’ targeted primarily at the youth at an affordable price point and Nseries - multimedia devices that have a special music edition.  Today Nokia has over six XpressMusic devices including Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, a touch device with human interface, Nokia 5310 XpressMusic, and Nokia 5130 the most affordable ‘XpressMusic’ device  amongst others.

As for mobile music, the feature will continue to be a key priority area for Nokia in 2009. With more than 425 million music-enabled mobile devices and more than 700 million devices with an FM radio sold till date makes Nokia the world’s largest manufacturer of music-enabled mobile devices, says Taneja. The company's Music Store is currently live in 15 markets globally, which has helped Nokia to gain insights on what

The company has tied up with a host of leading major independent Indian record labels including Tseries, Big Music, Eros, Venus and Yashraj, as also with the Indian Music Industry (IMI), a consortium of over 150 music companies. Nokia also has tie ups with international music labels like Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, EMI and Warner.

Nokia currently has over 15 entry devices that range from Rs 1300/- to Rs 5000/- which include FM Radio.