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Pictures: Nokia
When the sales are not doing too good, a change of direction might be the solution.
After Microsoft bought Nokia’s handheld operations in 2014 and Nokia started producing Lumia phones, the heydays of the Tampere-based company, which once was the market leader in the phone business, were pretty much over. In July, Microsoft announced it will cut 7,800 workers, most of them in its moribund smartphone unit.
But now Nokia has produced something special from under the sleeve: OZO, a virtual reality camera capable of capturing video and audio in 360 degrees, aimed for professional content creators.
“We’re thrilled to introduce OZO to the content creation world, and to define a completely new category of virtual reality capture and playback solutions,” Ramzi Haidamus, the president of Nokia Technologies, said in a bulletin.
“OZO aims to advance the next wave of innovation in VR [virtual reality] by putting powerful tools in the hands of professionals who will create amazing experiences for people around the world. We expect that virtual reality experiences will soon radically enhance the way people communicate and connect to stories, entertainment, world events and each other. With OZO, we plan to be at the heart of this new world.”
The camera is manufactured at Nokia’s facilities in Tampere. OZO is still going through a pretest phase, but Nokia is aiming the camera to become an industry standard for the media, advertising industry and Hollywood. The test phase is expected to be complete by fall.
OZO made its first appearance at an industry event in Los Angeles on Tuesday, attended by representatives from major studios, production houses and media and technology companies.
When finished, a camera of this calibre will not come off the shelves for cheap. The price is expected to reach five figures; definitely more than 10,000 euros.
