Nokia doubles spending in Ramazan

Finnish giant increases applications and teams up with TV channels.

KARACHI:

To further increase its lead in the country’s technology race, the Finnish tech giant has doubled spending in Ramazan this year and initiated joint ventures with local media partners to provide religious content for the upcoming holy month.

The company is also making efforts to increase users’ access to its content and applications, according to Nokia’s head of public relations Adeel Hashmi. “Earlier, applications were available on 30 per cent of our devices, but now we have expanded this to 84 per cent of our portfolio,” said Hashmi.

“The company’s Ramazan applications last year allowed people to access pre-programmed content that it came with, however, this time not only will content from the previous year be available, but it will update fresh content from the media content providers throughout Ramazan,” said Nokia Pakistan Solutions Manager Rabia Azfar. “The applications will update the content as soon as it is aired on the television and will be available to the public on their phones,” Azfar added.

Nokia launched three free Islamic and Ramazan applications on their OVI store for the public. Some key applications include uQuran Micro reciter, ARY QTV and ARY Zauq. Other applications include Quran lectures by Dr Israrul Haq of the Quran academy, Qibla Touch, Namaz.me, Weekly Quran and Hadith, Lesson of the Day, Boyoot Allah and Manasik.

“We want consumers to connect in the most meaningful and convenient way during the month of Ramazan,” said Nokia Pakistan and Afghanistan Head of Marketing Haseeb Ihtisham. He explained that the company wanted to make the OVI store a more valuable and locally relevant application market.

The uQuran mobile application offers the Holy Quran in verse by verse translation and recitation along with bookmarks. The application is fully functional with touch screen technology and Nokia claims that it is the only software of its kind offering full portrait and landscape viewing of the Quran for easy reading via mobile phone.

The partnership with a religious television channel QTV allows Nokia to have a mobile application which allows downloading of recitations from the Quran. Users can also download hamds and naats, view programme schedules, latest announcements and download other religious content and ringtones.

The third service, Zauq’s mobile application, enables users to access recipes on their mobile phones and keep themselves updated with the programme schedule, new announcements and expert cooking tips.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 27^th,  2011.