Nokia opens Ovi Store for business

Nokia has announced the availability of Ovi Store to an estimated 50 million Nokia device owners worldwide, across select Nokia models including the forthcoming flagship device, the Nokia N97.

Customers can visit store.ovi.com through their Nokia device browser to begin downloading and personalising their devices with applications, games, videos, podcasts, productivity tools, web and location-based services and much more.

Ovi Store is a one-stop-shop for new mobile content that consolidates Nokia’s existing content service, providing free and paid content. Thousands of the content industry’s biggest names along with independent application developers are distributing their media, applications and games through Ovi Store.

“Ovi Store is open for business and we’ve stocked the shelves with both local and global content for a broad range of Nokia devices,” said Tero Ojanperä, executive vice president, Nokia Services. “Ovi Store makes shopping for content and applications easy and fun for feature phone and smartphone owners alike.”

In available countries, customers can update their devices with the Ovi Store mobile application by selecting the Ovi Store icon in the Download! folder on their device.

The mobile client is available in English, German, Italian, Russian, and Spanish and supports operator billing in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Russia, Singapore, Spain and the United Kingdom. Globally, credit card billing is available through the mobile application and the mobile website.

Additional countries, languages, devices and features will be added throughout the year. AT&T plans to make Ovi Store available to its customers in the United States later this year.

Content providers and application developers can continue to sign up to distribute their content through Ovi Store by visiting publish.ovi.com.

The Nokia N97 is expected to start shipping in New Zealand in Q3 2009.