Gartner Inc (IT)

[MadeIt]

Finland's Nokia Corp. (NOK1V.HE) expects its new flagship N97 phone to generate significant sales and strengthen its brand when it reaches consumers next month, the handset maker's Swedish country manager Johan Eidhagen said in an interview with Dow Jones Newswires Monday.

"It will be incredibly important both for marketing and for generating sales," he said.

Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, announced the N97 in December 2008 and will start selling the device on a number of markets including the Nordic countries in June. Eidhagen said the phone, which will cost around EUR550 before taxes and subsidies, is aimed at a relatively wide target group but gave no sales targets.

Klas Strom, head of portfolio management at Nokia Scandinavia, said its key advantages are that users can personalize the start screen, and get more customized services through the use of applications. The combined touch screen and QWERTY keyboard should also appeal to many consumers, he told Dow Jones Newswires.

Last week, research firm Gartner Inc. (IT) said Nokia's first-quarter market share fell to 36.2% from 39.1% a year earlier amid a general decline in global handset sales, although sales of smartphones such as Apple Inc's (AAPL) iPhone and Nokia's 5800 bucked the declining trend.

Analyst Jan Dworsky at Handelsbanken said the N97 should boost Nokia's profitability, but that it's unlikely to improve the handset vendor's market share in terms of volumes since its price, although normal for a high-end phone, is rather high.

Johan Eidhagen said, however, that many of the N97's functions will become available also with cheaper phones at a later stage, so this may improve the company's market share further on.

At 0741 GMT Tuesday, shares in Nokia were down 1.4% at EUR10.65, against a 1.8% drop in the broader market in Helsinki.

Company Web site: http://www.nokia.com

-By Gustav Sandstrom, Dow Jones Newswires; [phone]; [e-mail]