It’s quite surprising how one of the world’s top cellular phone maker is opening up to Voice-over-Internet Protocol. Nokia has recently announced that it will soon release the 6136 model that supports VoIP over WiFi networks. This move is seen as bringing the Internet closer to the mass market through the ubiquitous mobile phone.
Currently, there are only a few Nokia models that support WiFi, and these are on the high end, including the Communicator PDA-phone series. And these models do not have built-in VoIP support. Nokia’s 6136, however, will be aimed at the mass-market to mid-range consumer base, and will have a built-in VoIP client. No exact details were given, though, as to which particular VoIP networks will be supported.
According to Nokia, it intends the 6136 to be used seamlessly across cellular and residential, office or public wireless networks. Nokia expects this hybrid technology to proliferate, with VoIP eventually becoming the more dominant technology. Until then, hybrid devices will most likely be among the top gadget choices by consumers.
In a way, this could be what analysts had predicted as the downfall of third-generation cellular telephony called 3G—we’re going straight to high-bandwidth, low cost networks with VoIP and WiFi.