BlackBerry Announces BBM is Coming to iOS on September 22nd

BlackBerry has announced that BBM is coming to iOS on September 22nd and to Android on September 21st.

That’s right BBM fans — the iconic mobile social network will begin rolling out for Android and iPhone customers around the world from September 21. Soon, you’ll be able to easily connect with friends on different platforms. As you may know BBM was previously exclusive to BlackBerry smartphones, and it will be available as a free download in Google Play and the App Store.

BBM for Android and iPhone features:
● BBM Chat – Enjoy real, immediate conversations with friends on Android, iPhone and BlackBerry smartphones. Not only does BBM let you know that your message has been delivered and read, it also shows you that your friend is responding to the message.

● More than chat – With BBM you can share files on your phone such as photos and voice notes, all in an instant.

● Keep your group in the loop – Multi-person chats are a great way to invite contacts to chat together. BBM Groups lets you invite up to 30 friends to chat together, and go a step further than multi-chat by sharing photos and schedules. And, with Broadcast Message, you can send a message out to all your BBM contacts at once.

● Post Updates and stay in the know – BBM lets you post a personal message, profile picture and your current status, and lets your contacts know instantly in Updates.

● Your unique PIN – Every BBM user has a unique PIN that maintains your privacy, so you don’t have to give out your phone number or email address to a new or casual contact.

Availability:
BBM will be available as a free download for Android smartphones running Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean (Android 4.x) beginning at 7AM EDT on September 21. BBM for iPhones running iOS 6 and iOS 7 will become available for each market on the App Store schedule of 12:01 AM local time on September 22. For more information, or to download BBM for Android or iPhone, visit www.BBM.com.

The company has also announced a BBM Channels feature which will launch later this year.

BBM Channels will provide a forum for active, real conversations between you and the people, brands, celebrities, artists, service providers, communities and more, that matter to you. By creating a Channel, individuals and brands can engage their friends and communities in conversations sparked by their thoughts, ideas and passions. Subscribing to a Channel will let you join conversations with people who share your interests. In addition, BBM Video calling and BBM Voice calling are planned for availability for Android and iPhone in a future version.

iOS 7 released

iOS 7 is released. You may update your iPhone 4 or later devices.

iOS 7 to be Available for Download Starting September 18

Apple has just announced at their iPhone event that iOS 7 will be available for all to download starting Wednesday, September 18. 

The iPhone 4 and later, the iPad 2 and later, the iPad mini and the 5th generation iPod touch will be the only devices compatible with the update. It will, of course, be free for all.

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Apple today announced iOS 7, featuring a completely redesigned stunning new user interface, will be available starting Wednesday, September 18 to iPhone, iPad and iPod touch users as a free software update. iOS 7 has hundreds of great new features, including Control Center, Notification Center, improved Multitasking, AirDrop, enhanced Photos, Safari, Siri and introduces iTunes Radio, a free Internet radio service based on the music you listen to on iTunes®. In addition, iOS 7 has been engineered with deep technical and design integration with both iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c. 

“iOS 7 is completely redesigned with an entirely new user interface and over 200 new features, so it’s like getting a brand new device, but one that will still be instantly familiar to our users,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “Next month we’ll be shipping our 700 millionth iOS device, and we’re excited about what our hundreds of thousands of iOS developers are doing to bring great new features to their apps.”

Apple engineered iOS 7 to take full advantage of the advanced 64-bit technologies in iPhone 5s, including the native 64-bit kernel, libraries and drivers. All the built-in apps have been re-engineered for 64-bit, and iOS 7 provides a seamless developer transition with Xcode® support and the ability to run both 32-bit and 64-bit apps. iOS 7 also provides deep integration with the new Touch ID™ sensor and takes full advantage of the new iSight® camera sensor to enable new features like automatic image stabilization, Burst Mode and Slo-Mo video with 120 fps. Combined with the new Camera App in iOS 7, iPhone 5s provides up to two-times faster auto-focus, faster photo capture and better dynamic range. iOS 7 is designed to complement the gorgeous exteriors of iPhone 5c, with matching wallpapers and translucency that carry the color through the entire experience.


With more than 200 new features, iOS 7 for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch includes:

● Control Center, which gives you quick access to the controls you want in one convenient place with just one swipe from the bottom of your screen;
● Notification Center, now available from the Lock screen so you can see all your notifications with a simple swipe, and the new Today feature gives you an at-a-glance view of your day with a summary of the important details such as weather, traffic, meetings and events;
● Improved Multitasking that gives users the ability to switch between their apps in a more visual and intuitive way, and iOS 7 pays attention to which apps you use most and automatically keeps your content up to date in the background;
● AirDrop, an entirely new way to quickly and easily share content with people nearby;
● New Camera app filters so you can add real-time photo effects, a square camera option, and you can quickly and easily switch between your four cameras—video, photo, square and panorama—with just a swipe;
● A redesigned Photos app that introduces Moments, a new way to automatically organize your photos and videos based on time and location;
● Full-screen browsing with Safari’s new redesigned user interface, the new smart search field helps simplify searching, and there’s a new view for your bookmarks and your Safari tabs;
● Siri with new male and female voices,* Twitter search integration, Wikipedia integration and Bing web searching within the app; and
● iTunes Radio, a free Internet radio service featuring over 200 stations and an incredible catalog of music from the iTunes Store®, combined with features only iTunes can deliver.

Additional new iOS 7 features include a new Find My iPhone Activation Lock, that requires your Apple ID and password before you can turn off Find My iPhone, erase data or re-activate a device after it’s been remotely erased; FaceTime audio for high quality calls over a data network; and new ringtones, alarms, alerts and system sounds.

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iOS 7 will be available as a free software update starting on Wednesday, September 18 for iPhone 4 and later, iPad 2 and later, iPad mini and iPod touch (fifth generation). 

Apple Tells Developers to Get Ready for Safari Push Notifications

Apple has sent an email to developers telling them to get ready for Safari Push Notifications which debut with OS X Mavericks.

OS X Mavericks introduces a powerful new way to keep users engaged with your website. You can now use the Apple Push Notifications Service to send notifications to your website users, right on their Mac desktop — even when Safari isn’t running. Safari Push Notifications work just like push notifications for apps. They display your website icon and notification text, which users can click to go right to your website.

Hit the link below for more info on Safari Push Notifications.

Samsung Announces GALAXY Note 3, GALAXY Note 10.1 (2014 Edition)

Samsung today announced the GALAXY Note 3 and GALAXY Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) at the IFA conference in Berlin, Germany.

GALAXY Note 3
Samsung GALAXY Note 3 comes with a wider (5.7inch) full HD Super AMOLED display, yet slimmer (8.3mm) and lighter (168g) hardware design, and more powerful and longer lasting (3,200mAh) battery. Also, equipped with a 13 megapixel rear camera with Smart Stabilization and high CRI LED flash, Samsung GALAXY Note 3 enables users to crisply capture every visual story in their lives, even in low light and active situations. Samsung GALAXY Note 3 offers the latest LTE technologies – CAT4 Carrier Aggregation and supports the greatest number of multiple frequencies. Incorporating the industry’s largest 3GB RAM, the GALAXY Note 3 also provides faster and more powerful performance. 


GALAXY Note 10.1 (2014 Edition)
Equipped with WQXGA Super clear LCD (2560x1600) resolution in a stunning 10-inch display, 1.9 GHZ Octa Core processor (for 3G / WiFi only version) and 3GB RAM, the GALAXY Note 10.1 (2014 Edition) demonstrates Samsung’s innovation leadership by delivering ultimate productivity capabilities while remaining extremely thin and light. In addition to enabling productivity, the device has been redesigned with a sleek, light, slim frame that is both fashionable and portable. 

The GALAXY Note 3 is set for launch starting September 25th and the GALAXY Note 10.1 will be available starting from Q3, 2013. The devices will likely reach customers ahead of Apple's new iPad 5 and iPad mini 2 which are not expected until October.

Sony Unveils New Waterproof Xperia Z1 Smartphone With 20.7MP Camera

Sony today unveiled a new 5-inch waterproof Xperia Z1 smartphone with a 20.7-megapixel camera.

The elegant, 5" Xperia Z1 is the latest addition to Sony's premium Z series of products and brings Sony's proven world-class technologies to the smartphone like never before - including the very best of Sony's camera expertise. Xperia Z1 features Sony's award-winning "G Lens" with a 27mm wide angle and bright F2.0 aperture, custom made large 1/2.3-type CMOS image sensor Exmor RS for mobile with 20.7MP and a BIONZ for mobile image processing engine. The combination of these technologies delivers the same level of quality and performance as a conventional compact digital camera in a slim, waterproof smartphone. Indeed, independent testing has confirmed that Xperia Z1 provides the best overall image quality of all leading smartphones1. This means that Xperia Z1 captures beautiful, sharp and bright images even in lowlight conditions. High shutter speeds and 3x clear image zoom also prevents shots from being blurred while enabling them to be captured at distance.



The phone comes with a set of Xperia Camera Applications:
● Social live: Broadcast precious moments live from Xperia Z1 to Facebook and get your friends' comments right on your screen.
● Info-eye: Innovative visual search function that provides related information on landmarks and on items such as books or wine simply by capturing them with the camera.
● Timeshift burst: Capture the perfect shot every time - Xperia Z1 takes 61 images in 2 seconds - a second before and after pressing the shutter - so you can scroll back and forth to find the perfect image.
● AR effect: Overlay a selection of fun, customizable animations to create pictures using Sony's SmartARTM augmented reality technology.

Notably, the Xperia Z1 features an aluminum body construction with tempered glass on the front and back. Inside the smartphone is a fully integrated Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor with 2.2 GHz quad-core CPU and 4G LTE, as well as a 3000 mAh battery for a high battery performance. Sony's Battery STAMINA Mode automatically turns off functions to save power when you don't need them and restarts them when you do.



Key Specifications:
● Sony's "G Lens": A lens with F2.0 and wide angle 27mm as well as 3x clear image zoom.
● BIONZ for mobile: Image processing engine with the algorithm from Sony's leading digital compact cameras. It ensures pictures have less noise, fast auto-focus as well as high stable images for video shooting, preventing shots from being blurred.
● 1/2.3-type Exmor RS for mobile CMOS image sensor with 20.7MP: high sensitivity sensor capturing huge amounts of detail for sharp, crisp images, even in low-light conditions.
● Dust and water-resistant (IP55 & IP58), with acclaimed OmniBalance design featuring durable tempered glass and solid one-piece aluminium frame
● Qualcomm Snapdragon™800 quad-core 2.2 Ghz processor, 3000 mAh battery, 4G LTE
● Xperia Camera Applications such as Social live which broadcast to Facebook. More applications will be available to download from Sony Select.
● Memory: RAM 2 GB, Flash memory up to 16 GB, Expansion slot microSD™ card, up to 64 GB.
● Available in black, white and purple colour variants

More details at the link below...

Nokia CEO Elop to move to Microsoft

Nokia said its chief executive,Stephen Elop, will move to Microsoft when the deal to acquire Nokia's handset business is closed. Nokia board chairman Risto Siilasmaawill take over CEO duties while the Finnish firm is looking for a new CEO.

Elop will lead an expanded Devices team, which includes all of the company's current Devices and Studios work and most of the teams coming over from Nokia, reporting to CEO Steve Ballmer.


Microsoft's Julie Larson-Green will continue to run the Devices and Studios team, and will be focused on the big launches this fall including Xbox One and Surface enhancements. Larson-Green will join Elop's team once the acquisition closes, and will work with him to shape the new organization. 

As part of the acquisition, a number of key engineering leaders will also be joining Microsoft from Nokia, reporting to Elop in his new capacity, these include: Jo Harlow, who will continue to lead the Smart Devices team; Timo Toikkanen, who will continue to lead the Mobile Phones team; Stefan Pannenbecker, who will lead Design and Juha Putkiranta, who will lead the integration effort on Nokia's behalf.

Elop was hired as Nokia CEO in 2010 from Microsoft.

Microsoft-Nokia deal: Lumia smartphones to get price cut in India

Microsoft's dramatic acquisition of Nokia's global cellphone business will result in a reduction in prices of Lumia handsets in most markets, including India, next year, possibly altering the dynamics of the country's fast-growing smartphone segment, say analysts. 

Microsoft early Tuesday morning (India time) said it would buy Finland-based Nokia's phone business and license its patents for over $7 billion, in a last-ditch attempt to compete in the mobile handset market dominated globally by Apple and Samsung. 

The deal will make Microsoft a hardware-software-services player and better position it to take on its aggressive global and local rivals, say analysts and industry executives. They add that India, where only about 10% of the 870 million mobile phone users own smartphones, could be a key growth market for the Redmond-headquartered company. 

But, some also feel that Microsoft may focus exclusively on smartphones, and exit the feature phone segment, which accounts for more than 90% of India's handsets. 

The deal will make Microsoft a hardware-software-services player and better position it to take on its aggressive global and local rivals. Rajiv Kaul, a former managing director at Microsoft India, told ET that the deal would imply that goodquality devices would flow in at lower prices into the Indian market. Device costs could go down by $30-40 (approx Rs 2,040-2,720) a handset, he said. "Much like Google Nexus phones of comparable specifications are cheaper by $30-40 and in some cases even $100 (Rs 6,800) than rivals." 

Nick Spencer, senior practice director, ABI Research, a New Yorkbased market research firm, said prices of the entry-level Nokia Lumia 520 could almost halve to less than $100 in some months from the time the deal closes in the first quarter of 2014. 

If this plays out, some say domestic players such as Micromax, Karbonn and Lava, and even South Korea's Samsung, which have left Nokia way behind in the smartphone sweepstakes in India, could get pulled into a price war in the segment. Nokia 520 costs about Rs 9,200 in India while domestic handset makers such as Micromax, Karbonn and Lava sell phones with similar specifications starting at around at Rs 3,500. Samsung prices its entrylevel smartphone at around Rs 5,000. 

A significant reduction in the price of Nokia devices could stir up the market and force its competitors to retaliate. BlackBerry, which doesn't have any phone in the sub-Rs 6,000 range, too could be hurt by a potential price churn at the lower end of the smartphone segment. 

A BlackBerry executive declined comment. "A preloaded software on a device, economies of scale, greater investment in product development that clearly wasn't happening in Nokia's case, and consolidated distribution channel together will help drive handset costs down," said Prashant Singhal of Ernst & Young. Analysts broadly concur that Microsoft would likely reduce prices only to the extent arising out of operational efficiencies. But, one can't rule out heavy price cuts if the company decides to get aggressive in customer acquisitions, especially in emerging markets like India. 

Lava co-founder Hari OmBSE 0.00 % Rai, however, said a price war was unlikely. "Microsoft phones will be cheaper than the current models they (Nokia) have, but only marginally, as the cost of hardware is almost same for all players." Marketers say given Nokia's laggard image, it might be a challenge for Lumia phones to give their rivals a run for their money. 

Nokia sells 12 Lumia models in India at different price points, with the most expensive model costing Rs 33,000. While this range of phones witnessed huge growth globally when it was launched in December 2011, it has not been a big hit in India so far. Nokia ceded its leadership position in India to Samsung in the last fiscal ended March 2013, after dominating the market since its entry in 1995. 

From a peak market share of over 70%, the Finnish handset maker's share fell to 27% in 2013. But its decline started a few years ago when it was caught unawares by the 'dual-SIM handset' revolution and was late to respond with its own offerings. Spencer from ABI Research said the fallout of the latest deal could be that Microsoft moves the Nokia business out of feature phones to focus on smartphones. India is Nokia's second-largest market and is at present dominated by feature phones, which account for a bulk of the Finnish company's sales as well. 

Any move out of the feature phone market — one that still accounts for 90% of the overall handset market in India — will present an opportunity for other local as well as Asian feature phone makers. 

At the same time, India's underpenetrated and fast-growing smartphone market will be an attractive proposition for Microsoft. Consultancy firm McKinsey estimates that the next over 200 million Internet users in India are likely to be on wireless mobile devices by 2015. "There's a huge untapped smartphone market in emerging economies from India, Asia, Africa to Latin America," said Katyayan Gupta, mobility analyst, Asia-Pacific, Forrester Research. Nokia owns a manufacturing facility in Chennai, where it makes mainly its feature phones but no smartphones.

A recent media report said the company in June wrote to the Indian government, complaining that it could shut down manufacturing in the country as it had become the "least favourable market" and that the "political risk" of operating in India may impact its future investment decisions. The report suggested that Nokia, one of India's top handset maker by sales, is upset that it wasn't getting the value-added-tax refunds it was promised for 10 years for setting up the plant in an SEZ in Tamil Nadu.

Microsoft eyes Apple-like revival with Nokia deal

With its purchase of Nokia's phone business, Microsoft is taking inspiration from Apple's way of making products, bringing hardware and software under a single roof where they can be more elegantly woven together.

But Microsoft already bears a strikingresemblance to Apple — the Apple of two decades ago, not the trailblazer of the mobile era. The $7.2 billion Nokia deal, which was reached late Monday, is unlikely to change that and catapult Microsoft up the ranks in the smartphone market.

That is because Microsoft, with its Windows phone operating system, is stuck in third place in that market, where all the oxygen has been drained by more established players.

Apple and Google have won the hearts and minds of developers, who design the apps that lure consumers to their devices, while Samsung is the dominant maker of mobile phones, most of which run Google's Android operating system. Even though Microsoft's and Nokia's products have won praise for their quality, they have arrived late.

"What matters is not the phone per se but a dynamic app and services ecosystem," said Brad Silverberg, a former senior Microsoft executive who is now a venture capitalist in the Seattle area.

Microsoft's predicament is a flashback to the situation Apple found itself in during the early 1990s. At that time, Apple arguably had a superior computer product, the Macintosh, but it languished as PCs running Microsoft's Windows operating system engulfed most of the market. One of the biggest problems for Apple then was that Microsoft had succeeded in gaining the allegiance of software developers, who produced a bounty of applications.

"They're stuck in the same vicious cycle that Apple was in 20 years ago," said Benedict Evans, an analyst with Enders Analysis, a research firm, and a former strategist in the wireless industry.

The challenges for the marriage of Nokia and Microsoft go far beyond support from developers. Microsoft is in the midst of the biggest organizational changes in its 38-year history. In mid-July, Steven A Ballmer, Microsoft's chief executive, unveiled a plan to restructure the company's often clashing fiefs into business groups intended to cooperate more.

While the new organization seemed to set up Ballmer as the maestro in charge of keeping the various groups in harmony, he stunned the tech industry late last month by announcing his plans to retire from Microsoft within 12 months. Ballmer said he was leaving earlier than planned because he felt the company needed a leader prepared to stay longer. That fueled speculation that Ballmer had been encouraged to leave by Microsoft's board.

Blending a major acquisition into a company is challenging enough in times of calm. Doing so with the unexpected management change at Microsoft could make it even harder, tech industry executives and analysts said.

"The issue I wonder about is the amount of complexity Microsoft is taking on its business by absorbing Nokia at the same time it is reorganizing at the same time Windows 8 is faltering," said Michael Mace, a former executive at Palm and Apple who now runs an app development company in Silicon Valley, Zekira. "It's scary from that standpoint."

While Ballmer plans to leave Microsoft after a successor is found, he was very much involved in cutting the Nokia deal. Over the last several months, Ballmer and his deputies met in places like Redmond, London and Helsinki with counterparts in the talks, led by Risto Siilasmaa, Nokia's chairman. The style of Ballmer, an exuberant leader with a booming voice, was a stark contrast to the reserved, gentlemanly manner of Siilasmaa, according to a person present during many of the meetings.

Microsoft is under enormous pressure to reinvent itself for a world where mobile devices are the animating force in technology, rather than personal computers. Sales of PCs are suffering the most prolonged decline in their history. Two powerful pistons of Microsoft's business — Windows and the Office suite of applications — are tied to closely to the health of the PC market.

The Nokia deal plunges Microsoft deeper into hardware than ever before. It is a business with enormous complexities — managing sprawling overseas supply chains, for one — that are not as prevalent in the software business. While it has had success in hardware through its Xbox video game console, Microsoft has also badly stubbed its toe in this area. It recently took a $900 million charge stemming from slow-moving sales of Surface, a tablet computer it created to compete with the iPad.

Unlike some companies like BlackBerry that have missed technology shifts, Microsoft still has vast financial resources that could give it a lot of room to develop a mobile strategy that produces results. Because of the huge profits it makes from its flagship software business, "Microsoft has choices most companies don't," said Bill Whyman, an analyst at ISI Group.

Nokia remains the second-biggest maker of cellphones in the world, when inexpensive feature phones are considered as part of the calculation. The company has footholds in large emerging markets like India that could eventually move to smartphones.

Microsoft and Nokia became partners over two years ago, when Nokia agreed to standardize its smartphones on Microsoft's mobile operating system. In an interview on Monday night, Ballmer said he believed that Microsoft and Nokia had "done incredibly well in the last couple of years" in the mobile market and that the Windows Phone operating system had emerged as a "clear No. 3" in smartphones.

But that is far from No. 1 in this arena. Microsoft's software ran on 3.7% of the smartphones shipped during the second quarter, compared with 13.2% for Apple and 79.3% for Android, according to IDC.

Microsoft has argued that the selection of apps available for its phones is improving all the time. There are still big developers that have not produced software for Windows Phone, like Facebook's Instagram, but far fewer than there used to be. The company says there are more than 1,70,000 Windows Phone apps.

One unsettling possibility for Microsoft in mobile is what has occurred in the internet search market, where the company's Bing search engine lags far behind the market leader, Google. Microsoft has conducted exhaustive research showing that Bing search results are equivalent or better than those of Google. But the affinity for the Google brand is strong for most people.

The question is whether a similar perception dooms Microsoft's mobile phones to the margins of the industry.

"They're making something arguably very well designed, but it doesn't matter," Evans, the analyst, said. "I think they're late."

Microsoft buys Nokia mobile unit to fight Apple, Google

Nokia on Tuesday said it was selling its beleaguered mobile phone unit to Microsoft for $7.17 billion (5.44 billion euros) as the US tech giant tries to fight back against rivals Apple and Google. 

Investors cheered the news, as Nokia's share price soared by 45% in opening trading on the Helsinki stock exchange to 4.3 euros. 

Nokia, once the world's leading mobile phone maker, will grant the US software giant a 10-year non-exclusive licence to its patents and will itself focus on network infrastructure and mapping services, which it called "the best path forward for Nokia and its shareholders." 

With Tuesday's announcement, Microsoft is following in the footsteps of its internet rival Google, which already invested in hardware when it bought US phone manufacturer Motorola. 

Nokia and Microsoft entered into a partnership in 2011 to create Nokia smartphones using Microsoft's Windows Phone software. 

Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer told reporters the Nokia acquisition "will accelerate our success in smartphones." 

He said Windows Phone was "the fastest growing smart platform today, growing by 78% last year." 

Analysts saw Tuesday's move as a bid to compete with Google and Apple. 

"The trigger behind this is without a doubt the current restructuring of business at Microsoft in which the tech giant attempts to stem the decline in global product sales," ETX Capital analyst Ishaq Siddiqi said in a comment. 

Microsoft "is still behind Apple and Android-based handset devices in the global mobile phones market share but under this deal, Microsoft can start to take control of the operation and turn Nokia's declining handset business into a formidable competitor in a competitive market," he said.

Nokia also announced the immediate departure of chief executive Stephen Elop, who was hired from Microsoft in 2010 to turn the company around. 

He will be replaced in the interim by Risto Siilasmaa, Nokia's chairman of the board. 

Elop will take over Nokia's mobile phone unit, and will transfer back to Microsoft once the deal is completed, Nokia said, triggering speculation that he could take over as head of Microsoft after Ballmer's scheduled retirement within the next 12 months. 

"We expect Elop becomes a more viable candidate for Microsoft chief executive, given the obvious importance of devices," Citi Research said in a comment. 

Nokia dominated the mobile phone market for 14 years, until it was overtaken by Samsung in 2012 as the top-selling brand, as it struggled to establish winning business models and mobile devices amid increasing competition from Apple's iPhone and Samsung's Galaxy. 

Rumours of a Nokia sale have swirled in recent months. 

Nokia dramatically changed its strategy in February 2011 when Elop warned the company was "standing on a burning platform" and needed to shift course immediately. 

The shake-up involved phasing out Nokia's Symbian platform in favour of the partnership with Microsoft, and Nokia bet its future on its new line of Lumia smartphones. 

But Tuesday's announcement marks the end of Nokia's days as a phone manufacturer. 

"Management concluded that there was no improvement in sight anytime soon. From that point of view, the sale could be a wise decision," Pohjola bank analyst Hannu Rauhala told the online edition of business daily Taloussanomat. 

Some 32,000 Nokia employees are expected to transfer to Microsoft, including some 4,700 people in Finland, the company said. 

The operations affected by the transfer generated approximately 14.9 billion euros in 2012, or almost 50% of Nokia's net sales, it added. 

Nokia will book a gain on the sale of some 3.2 billion euros, which will "clearly strengthen our financial position and it will provide a solid basis for future investment in Nokia's continuing businesses," Siilasmaa said. 

Last month, Nokia finalised the purchase of German engineering giant Siemens' 50% stake in Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) for 1.7 billion euros. 

NSN, which is specialized in high-speed mobile broadband, was set up as a joint venture between the two companies in 2007, a partnership that expired in April. The unit has posted stronger earnings than Nokia's mobile phone business. 

NSN posted a net profit of 8 million euros in the second quarter of this year, compared to Nokia's net loss of 227 million euros in the same period. 

Going forward, Nokia now needs to invest in its networks systems, where its main rivals will be Sweden's Ericsson and Huawei of China, according to Danske Bank Markets analyst Ilkka Rauvola. 

"Huawei's market share is growing and Ericsson's is stagnating. That's Nokia's real challenge," Rauvola said. 

Tuesday's announcement is also likely to spark speculation about the future of another big yet struggling phone maker, RiM's BlackBerry of Canada. 

Microsoft's acquisition is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2014.