With the announcement of its Nseries range of multimedia devices, Nokia Corp has staked a claim to a major share of the smartphone segment that is growing more than 100 per cent year-on-year.

Nokia's Nseries range of multimedia devices, based on 3G and WLAN technologies, aims to offer users a single device, merging the phone, pda, camera, music player, e-mail and internet.

The first Nokia Nseries product, the N70 3G Series 60 smartphone with 2 megapixel camera, is expected to be shipped from the second quarter of 2005, followed by the N90, targeted at mobile photography enthusiasts, and the N91, optimised for mobile music, by the end of the year.

"There is tremendous growth in this segment and Neries will form be the bulk of Nokia's multimedia products as we go forward", said Jorma Ollila, Nokia CEO and Chairman.

According to Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia's Executive Vice President of Multimedia, "This next step in digital convergence brings together mobile devices, internet content, still and video cameras, music and e-mail and so much more.

"Nokia Nseries devices share similar design traits as mobile phones, but they are actually powerful pocketable computers with a comprehensive set of multimedia features."

The N91 handset, expected to go on sale in the fourth quarter, will have a 4GB hard drive able to store up to 3,000 songs and have a built-in radio and camera. With it, Nokia will begin competing directly with stand-alone digital music players and offer users the added benefit of being able to download and share music while on the move.

"In the future we will be competing not only with traditional competitors within our industry, but also increasingly with vendors from the IT and consumer electronics industries, who have competing products," he said.

In the medium-term, 20 per cent of Nokia's business is likely to come from this segment. The company expects to sell over 25 million smartphones in 2005, up from 12 million last year. The company also expects to ship over 100 million camera phones this year. Globally there will be more than half a billion camera phones in use by the end of 2005.

In 2004, Nokia sold more than a million phones with mp3 players built into them. This year more than half of its phone models are expected to have music functionality. The company expects to sell 40 million mobile devices that have mp3 players built into them this year, representing a 300 per cent increase over last year.