Nokia Launches Critical N900 Phone

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"The smartphone situation is not going to be fixed until the back end of 2011," he says.

The N900 has some superficial similarities to the iPhone. The touchscreen responds to a user's finger, but the handset also comes with a stylus that is necessary for navigating Web sites. Unlike the iPhone, the N900 also has a keyboard that slides out from the side of the handset, with the keys arranged much like on a laptop.

One advantage of the Maemo operating system is that it allows the N900 to run a version of the Mozilla Firefox browser that is almost as capable as the PC version. With a fast Wi-Fi connection, a preproduction version of the N900 loaned to BusinessWeek surfed the Net as fast as a PC. The high-resolution, 3.5-inch screen did a good job of displaying Web pages, which can be magnified with the tap of the stylus.

Attracting the Right Apps

What may matter more than the N900's features, though, is whether Maemo inspires software developers to write apps for it. Nokia is hoping that app creators will gravitate to Maemo because its open-source code is not cloaked in secrecy, allowing developers to better exploit its capabilities. "We really provide for those hackers who want to create something deeply integrated," says Maemo chief Jaaksi.

Nokia also is providing a software tool named Qt that should make it easy for developers to easily adapt software written for Maemo to the older Symbian operating system, which is used in most other Nokia smartphones. Nokia has recently underscored that it expects both operating systems to coexist for many years. Adapting programs written for Linux to Maemo also should be relatively easy, Nokia says.

Nokia's big disadvantage, though, is one that Maemo won't quickly fix. Largely because of the iPhone, the U.S. has become the world's app incubator. The N900 will be available in North America, but Nokia's weak market position there means many developers don't bother writing apps for the company's products. "All the major buzz around developers is in the U.S.," says Strategy Analytics' Mawston. "With Nokia not having a presence there, they're not getting on the radar screens of the most important developers."

Ewing is BusinessWeek's European regional editor.

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