Nokia Comes With Music phone sales to start Oct 17

Nokia‘s recently introduced bundled Comes with Music service and phone for the UK market will become reality on October 17 when the first handset with the service will become available for purchase on retailer site Carphone Warehouse, says a Thursday report. The retailer will be the exclusive seller of the first Nokia handset, the 5310, pictured. The one-year subscription to the music service will add a one-time fee of about $120 to the price of the handset.

The service will offer songs from Universal, Sony BMG and the Warner Music labels, and users will be allowed to keep the songs they downloaded over the one-year period, the amount of which carries no limits. Nokia faces the main hurdle of an expected unwillingness of network providers to sell the Comes with Nokia phones, as the service competes with many of their own, pay-per-download or monthly music subscription services. If the phones are sold by carriers, they would be offered with rebates based on the length of a new service contract, lowering their prices and allowing Nokia to sell more handsets.

While the first Comes With Music handset will be offered on the UK retailer, no prices or other official details are known. More information on the launch is expected to come in early October at a special event.

Filed under: audio
Other story tags: Nokia, Comes With Music