Nokia has a family of devices that offer smartphones at each price segment, and a new development suggests that it will also be one of the first to bring 5G to affordable smartphones.
HMD Global’s Chief Product Officer, Juho Sarvikas, took to Twitter to congratulate Qualcomm on the launch on the Snapdragon 690 chipset that is designed to power mid-range devices.
He also talked about how it will help Nokia bring 5G to a more affordable price point. This isn’t the first time Nokia is doing this to talk about its upcoming products.
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Congratulations @cristianoamon and the awesome team at @Qualcomm for the launch of #Snapdragon 690 Mobile Platform! We are excited to bring our Nokia Phones vision of a truly global, future proof 5G experience at an even more affordable price with this transformational platform! pic.twitter.com/yctqfE13sYJune 17, 2020
Towards the end of the Snapdragon 690 unveiling, Qualcomm also confirmed that Nokia will be one of the first partners to bring the new 5G chipset to the market.
It is the first Snapdragon 600 series processor with 5G capabilities, thanks to a new X51 RF modem. It supports global bands, NSA and SA on the sub-6 spectrum so it won't be suitable for carriers with mmWave technology.
The Snapdragon 690 implements an 8nm octa-core design, with two big Kryo 560 cores clocked at up to 2GHz (for performance) and six little ARM Cortex-A55 cores (for efficiency). The CPU performance is said to be 20% better than the Snapdragon 675.
Other hardware specifications of the chipset include support for cameras with a resolution of 192MP or 32MP with multi-frame noise reduction and zero shutter lag.
On the video side, we’re looking at Full HD recording at 120fz and QHD at 60fps, with support for HDR10+. Qualcomm Quick Charge 4+ is also supported. Mind you, these are the best-case scenario capabilities, and may not necessarily make it onto all smartphones.
Considering that the Nokia 8.3 5G was just recently unveiled, which opted for a Snapdragon 700 series chipset, we expect this teased device to be part of the Nokia 7 line.
The Nokia 7.2 is due for a refresh, adding more substance to this speculation. Qualcomm also suggested that the Snapdragon 690-powered devices are expected to be priced in the $300-$500 range, which is precisely Nokia 7 series territory.
In the comments of the tweet, Sarvikas also hinted that the device will bring a high refresh rate display, which no Nokia phone currently offers. No other details about the device were shared, but it is expected to launch later this year.
