HMD Global is in the process of acquiring Bluetooth certificates for what seems to be the upcoming Nokia 9 PureView Android flagship, as newly discovered documents reveal the existence of three variants of the device bearing the model numbers TA-1087, TA-1082, and TA-1094. The former two are new and haven’t hit the media radar before, but the TA-1094 is a model number that has been previously associated with the Nokia 9 PureView and was mentioned in databases of other regulatory agencies based in China earlier this year. Hardware details are missing from the newly emerged Bluetooth application but at least confirm the upcoming Android handset will offer Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity.
Background: A Bluetooth certificate usually indicates that the product being certified is nearing its market release, but HMD Global hinted in a recent interview that the Nokia 9 PureView is not scheduled for an official unveiling this year. Instead, market watchers expect the flagship to be unveiled in January at CES in Las Vegas, or later near the end of February during Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The OEM previously confirmed that it wishes to have a bigger focus on the flagship smartphone segment next year, and this should mean that the Nokia 9 PureView will not be the only Nokia-branded smartphone of its kind to hit the shelves in 2019. As yet, it’s not entirely clear whether all three model numbers refer to the same device range, i.e. the Nokia 9 PureView, but the TA-1094 should certainly denote one variant of the flagship. On the other hand, the TA-1087 and TA-1082 could be variants of the same device meant for other markets, or they could end up being different Nokia-branded smartphones altogether.
Impact: Although not yet official, the Nokia 9 PureView is expected to sport the Snapdragon 845 chipset from Qualcomm and not the latest Snapdragon 855 solution. This means that HMD Global’s upcoming flagship certainly won’t be 5G-enabled, and this is further strengthened by the Bluetooth documents describing the tested devices as 4G smartphones with Bluetooth support. As the moniker implies, the Nokia 9 PureView is expected to deliver a powerful main camera setup featuring three sensors or more, so it’s possible that the flagship will focus on improving upon existing imaging features of the Finnish company’s mobile portfolio rather than adopting brand-new technologies. The device has been seemingly code-named “Olympic” on account of sporting five rear-facing cameras which, in theory, should provide extremely versatile tools for post-processing and augmented reality, but time will tell if this will be the case. A previous leak also suggested that the device should be running Android 9 Pie out of the box. HMD Global’s ongoing software strategy is not to fiddle with custom implementations of Google’s operating system too much and simply focus on deploying timely firmware updates, so the Nokia 9 PureView should be shipped with Google’s latest mobile OS version and be among the first in line for future OS upgrades throughout 2019 and beyond. Whether or not it will provide a feature-rich camera application worthy of the PureView moniker remains to be seen.