Nokia X7, a.k.a. Nokia Journey, Canceled by AT&T File under: News By: Evan Blass | 7:43 PM 15-Jan-11
Contrary to our report yesterday, it now appears that AT&T has cancelled plans to release the Nokia X7 touchscreen, which supposedly would have retailed as the Nokia Journey. According to someone close to the situation, the carrier had planned to launch the phone on February 13th (and not this month, as we had previously reported to be a possibility) -- just a day before Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, a likely date for Nokia to be announcing its MWC lineup. Apparently some manufacturers were already gearing up to provide accessories for the Symbian^3-powered Journey, as is evident in the Body Glove screenshot below.
Since the decision to drop the X7 / Journey apparently came from AT&T's end, we're not sure what this says for Nokia's hopes of cracking the American market; the GSM-only manufacturer has but two carrier options here in the US, so an aborted AT&T rollout could be a serious blow to Espoo if, as we were told, the network provider has "nothing else...on the horizon" with respect to Nokia handsets. Frankly the reaction we saw to news of a stateside X7 release was rather lukewarm, making us suspect that Nokia really only has a chance here with a MeeGo-powered flagship device.
Possibly notable is the fact that Nokia trademarked five other words besides Journey in the same one week period back in May 2010, all with the same description: Allure, Temptation, Preview, Relate, and Stimulus. A sixth mark, Captivate, was also filed for but then abandoned, most likely because of the release of the Samsung Galaxy S variant by that name on AT&T.