Nokia prepares smartphone assault with Symbian^3 while MeeGo will target US market

Despite another set of less than stellar financial figures, Nokia boss Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo says the company has several reasons to be optimistic about the future.

Most notable is the roll out of its much anticipated Nokia N8 device, the first running the new Symbian^3 operating system. It's due to be available during September.

Nokia also revealed more of its future smartphone plans with Kallasvuo saying it was going to deliver a family of smartphones based on Symbian^3, predicting 50 million sales during the next 12 months. Nokia sold 24 million smartphones during the past three months.

"Symbian^3 software platform that is targeted to offer a clearly improved user experience, a high standard of quality, and competitive value to consumers," the company detailed in its financial report.

But while Symbian^3 will provide the backbone of its 2010 and 2011 smartphones, it's not the only operating system Nokia will be using.

It's known the N8 will be the only Nseries device to use Symbian^3, with Symbian^4 highlighted for new Nseries phones.

In addition, the Nokia-Intel joint venture OS MeeGo will be used specifically to make high-end devices - which Nokia called mobile computing devices - target for the North American market, where Nokia has a tiny market share.

"We are planning to have more advanced features in MeeGo and will supply a richer set of APIs for MeeGo computers," said Nokia Chief Financial Officer Timo Ihamuotila in a call with analysts.