Nokia has faced operator opposition since it announced it push into services as exemplified in its Ovi announced at the Go Play event in London six weeks ago. The most obvious face of this has been the relative lack of operator take up, in the UK at least, of the Nokia N81. With this Telefónica announcement Nokia shows that there are operators who are willing to engage with an use Nokia service offerings.

Nokia is in a difficult situation because expansion in to Internet services is the key to the company's future, but it is an area which many operators regard as their sacred territory both because of revenue implications and the belief they should control all customer interactions. However Operators are largely regarded, for the most part, as having failed to live up to expectations in building compelling Internet services for their customers. There is a certain logic to believing that manufacturers, with their experience in design and software and a global reach, may be able to do better.

It is worth noting that Telefónica have a good history of evaluating third party services with its customer base. Telefónica has recently signed agreements with a number of other providers including Yahoo. That said this is a very significant step forward for Nokia and is a first step down the road to seeing its services being accepted and adopted by operators.

Press release extract:

Telefónica and Nokia today announced they are working together to accelerate the adoption of new Internet services on mobile devices by providing Telefónica customers with easy access to both Telefónica and Nokia Internet services.  The collaboration includes areas such as menu customization, technology and billing co-operation.

 As part of the collaboration, Nokia will customize the new Multimedia Menu to provide easy access to Telefónica services. Similarly, Telefonica customers will be able to access all Nokia services through the Multimedia Menu.

 

Julio Linares, General Manager for Coordination, Business Development and Synergies, Telefónica S.A. said, "We want to provide our customers with an unparalleled mobile experience and by working with partners like Nokia, we can ensure that they have access to the best in Internet services. Our customers can take advantage of Telefónica's high quality mobile broadband network to access both Telefónica and Nokia services, as well as other third-party applications, and I'm confident that this will drive a dramatic increase in user uptake of these new services over the coming years."

 

"We're extremely excited about this collaboration as I believe it can pave the way for a new way of working throughout our industry. Ease of use has always been at heart of Nokia devices and this collaboration is an important step in creating the same experience for Internet services," said Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President and General Manager Nokia Multimedia. "Nokia devices and services are based on open standards, which makes it easy for us to work with forward thinking operators such as Telefónica to provide consumers with choice regarding which Internet services they want to access from their mobile device."