Nokia delays N8 launch to October

Nokia's new chief executive suffered a blow on his first day, after it emerged that the mobile phone giant had been forced to delay the release of its flagship N8 smartphone yet again.

One of the biggest failures of former chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo's reign was Nokia's inability to compete in the high end smartphone market, leading to his departure 10 days ago. His replacement, Stephen Elop, who joined from Microsoft, officially took up the role yesterday.

Analysts had said at the time that the N8 "needs to be the foundation of Nokia's recovery" in claiming market share from devices including Apple's iPhone and those running Google's Android operating system.

Yesterday, the Finnish group said that it had received "a record number of online pre-orders" for the device but warned customers would not receive it, as they had expected, this month. The shares dropped over 4 per cent following the news. This is not the first time the N8 has been hit by delays. The device was originally due to ship in June, but the company was forced to push the release back to September. Nokia blamed the latest problems on final adjustments. The group added that because "it can take time from the beginning of shipment to arriving at their doorstep, in full transparency, we have advised our pre-order customers that they should expect their new Nokia N8 in October."