Nokia unveiled the world's first luxury mobile phone company yesterday.
Vertu Ltd, an independently run subsidiary of Nokia, will start selling its phone range at its stores in some of the most exclusive shopping areas in the United States, Europe and Asia by mid-2002, the company said.
The first devices, costing a staggering $21,240, will be cased in platinum, display a sapphire crystal glass screen and offer a sound as clear as a Mozart symphony, Vertu said at the company's launch in Paris during the fashion show week.
The heart of the phone - the technology that allows users to make and receive calls, use calendars, contact books and games - will be specially designed for its super-rich customers.
Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone maker, hopes the Vertu brand will create a new segment in the high-profit luxury goods market at a time when mobile phone sales are slowing after years of runaway growth.
"We're taking a huge leap forward here," Vertu chief designer Mr Frank Nuovo told Reutersin a telephone interview.
"We're beginning from a blank slate to create this entire company . . . we're lifting all restrictions," said Mr Nuovo. He is credited with turning Nokia's phone designs into the most competitive in the industry. He will keep his position at Nokia.
The new London-based company, which has secretly been in the works for more than five years, will be funded by Nokia but will have its own management team and over 200 staff worldwide.