Talking shop
Vodafone has refreshed its range of own-brand handsets due to launch this spring with a trio of value offerings including a new featurephone.
The Vodafone 455 is described as an entry-price feature phone with a touch screen. It runs Opera Mini for internet browsing and boasts a 2.4 inch colour screen, 1.3MP camera and music player. Here is an image.
Dubbed by Vodafone as its 'most affordable' own-brand mobile internet phone, the 351 comes with pre-loaded Opera Mini, an FM radio, camera, plus 2MB of onboard memory which can be supplemented via a Micro SD card. Here is an image.
Finally, the Vodafone 252 is simply a re-fresh of the previous model with a basic colour display, standard voice and text functions but now comes with M-PESA preloaded. Here is an image.
Patrick Chomet, Vodafone's group director of Terminals, said the new handset range will allow it to extend its internet services in ‘places of real need'.
"Across the world we are seeing significant changes in how people use their mobile phones to access the internet and other data services - but those changes are not evenly distributed - data penetration in India is at just 6 percent compared to 37 percent in Europe. By lowering the price and technology barriers to access, the handsets we're announcing today will let many more customers in emerging markets participate in and benefit from next generation mobile services," he said.
He added that the Opera Mini browser is one of ‘the cornerstones' of data strategy for emerging markets and for pre-pay feature phones in Europe as it is able to run over lower capacity mobile networks. The service has been rolled out across 20 markets.
