Here is another big blow for businesses who are getting big bucks by partnering with Nokia. Nokia has reportedly decided that it would not use any more outside contract manufacturers for the fabrication process of its phones. According to the company, due to weak global demand on the phone market, it would stop outsourcing its production to Electronics Manufacturing Service (EMS) providers or to Original Design Manufacturers (ODMs).

Back in 2008, the Finnish mobile phone maker outsourced around 17 percent of the manufacturing volume of its mobile phone engines. The outsourcing included phones and the software that enabled its basic operations, while the companies involved were Foxconn International Holdings, BYD, Elcoteq and Jabil Circuit. Nokia’s announcement is bad news for contract manufacturing and mobile handset businesses, yet it shows that the company is able to adjust according to changing market demand.

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The Nokia 5730 XpressMusic is the first music-optimized phone to offer a full QWERTY keyboard for easier messaging. The real highlight for the Nokia 5730 is the Homescreen for XpressMusic. This provides access and dynamic information on music, people, games, email and calendar.

The Homescreen features an improved contacts bar with up to 20 friends and family members and provides direct access to music, N-Gage and other applications, like Facebook, Photos, Ovi Contacts, Maps, messaging and more. With Ovi Contacts, people see which friends are online, chat and even view what music they are listening to.

With the dedicated gaming keys the Nokia 5730 XpressMusic is a true N-Gage gadget. Direct access to the N-Gage Arena community and the preloaded N-Gage games invite to connect and compete and check high scores with online friends.

The Nokia 5730 XpressMusic is expected to begin shipping in the third quarter of 2009 for an estimated retail price of 280 EUR before subsidies and taxes.

(Source) Nokia

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