Microsoft still releases Nokia budget phone without Windows Phone

Microsoft has released the Nokia 130, a simple 2G mobile phone with a price of 25 dollars, converted 19 euros. With that, the software giant still seems to see bread in the market for cheap mobile phones, despite an earlier announcement that it would step out of this market.

The Nokia 130 is positioned between the Nokia 105 and Nokia 220. The device has a 1.8 “screen with a resolution of 160×128 pixels. Bluetooth is also present, as well as a micro-SD card reader, a micro-USB input and a minijack connection.Operation is via a traditional keypad and the device is only suitable for 2g networks, internet functionality is completely missing, but an FM radio is present.

According to Microsoft, the device with its 1020mAh battery offers a standby time of 36 days, while it can play up to 16 hours of video. When playing MP3s, a battery life of 46 hours is specified for the Nokia 130. There should also be a dualsim version of the device on the market. The Nokia 130 is very cheap with a price of 25 dollars, or 19 euros. The device therefore runs on Series 30+, a variant of the old Series 30 platform.

The arrival of the Nokia 130 is striking, because Microsoft recently announced that it would be scrapping the Nokia X line of smartphones. Also feature phones in the Asha series, which run on the basis of S40, should disappear from the Nokia portfolio. The software giant would like to focus entirely on devices based on its own Windows Phone operating system. Nevertheless, Microsoft employee Jo Halow indicates in an interview with Recode that the company still sees opportunities in extremely cheap devices for the time being, especially for emerging economies.