Nokia’s major announcement next week may be a virtual reality headset

Hot on the heels of the news that Nokia is set to sell its Here mapping division to Audi, BMW and Daimler, Recode has just published a report that says the Finnish company will announce a major virtual reality project next week.

Citing several unnamed sources, the publication says to expect the announcement at the company’s upcoming July 28th event in Los Angeles, California. As the Recode notes, should Nokia announce a virtual reality headset, it will be the company’s first consumer-facing product launch since the sale of its handset division to Microsoft in 2013.

When Nokia asked news publications to attend its event next week, it sent out an invitation that prominently featured the words “Nowhere” and “Now Here”. As I noted in my post on the sale of Here to Audi, BMW and Daimler, those two phases prompted some to speculate that Nokia was planning to announce something relating to its mapping division. However, that play on words now makes a lot more sense in the context of a virtual reality announcement. Moreover, the location of the announcement in Los Angeles, the centre of the entertainment world, seems to support the virtual reality angle as well.

Of course, we’ll have to wait to see what Nokia has in store, but what is clear is that the company is undergoing a transformative moment right now.

[source]Recode[/source]