Jolla’s CEO Jussi Hurmola seems to be one busy man if the amount of interviews tells you anything.
Here’s one right from today with quite a bit new information. Only cherry picked some comments here, not the whole interview. You can read the whole text from here with a help of Google translate (original text in Finnish).
First some talk about D.Phone Group deal that was announced today, he also mentions there has been a lot of interested in Finland, but nothing to tell as of now. Though he adds that it would be pretty much miracle if nobody in Finland or Europe was not selling their phone.
What kind of customer segments are you seeking? Is Jolla’s phone a mere Linux nerds toy?
– Jolla’s phone will be a real smartphone meant for mass market.
– Customers can’t go playing too much with the kernel, neither can they go flash totally new software
– The idea is to make open source phone made for the community, where the above would be possible
Nokia took several years to bring MeeGo phone Nokia N9 out, that in the end became semi-Maemo phone. How in earth are you going to get real MeeGo phone out in a half of the year? Why did it take Nokia so long?
Hurmola finds the question funny
- We where previously making MeeGo inside Nokia, we know all too well what went wrong. We will concentrate at making one thing at the time and will heavily use partners.
What is the situation regarding the rights of MeeGo, code is only partly licensed under Open Source. Can you really make MeeGo-based phones? What elements should be encoded by you guys? Did Nokia sell them to you?
– Jolla’s software stack is very similar to other manufacturers.
– Mostly open source
– Some of the basics like chipset, GSM-, UMTS ja UI code are licensed from others, just like all the others do.
– Wont go on details from who have the licensed and what they have exactly licensed.
Tell me something about the forthcoming device. Does it have physical keyboard, and what SoC does it have inside?
– Can’t tell anything as of now. Can’t example tell more about Intel partnership (?)
– Device will be announced this year, but can’t yet talk about Holiday release. Don’t wanna say too much yet.
– Modern smartphone that will be based on independent open source software.
You mentioned Jolla’s strength will be user experience. What will it do better than iPhone, Windows Phone or Android? Or the other way around, which is their biggest problem?
Jolla wants to bring something fresh compared to iPhone OS or Android. We want to bring those things to your phone that where loved on MeeGo, which are real multitasking, application integration and data integration. I use N9 in all my work related tasks and I like the fact that all of its applications are always open. – Jussi Hurmola
The manner where you constantly open and close apps need to be get rid off. The user interface should also be customizable.- Juss Hurmola
When our smartphone comes to the market it must have a lot of apps available. At the latest when the device is announced how to get the apps. – Jussi Hurmola
What about the most important question, will there be Angry Birds?
Angry Birds is already working on earlier MeeGo device. – Jussi Hurmola
