Vodafone makes mobiles simple
It might seem odd in an age of 3G handsets offering video calling, music playback and even TV, but Vodafone is getting back to basics. Announced on Friday were the first pair of mobiles in its range of handsets titled Vodafone Simply. Made in France by Sagem, the new phones (the VS1, a silver, stylish handset, and the Sagem VS2; a simple black candy bar design) are noddy devices, all big screens and large buttons that are aimed at those groups (we wouldn’t dare to suggest an age, sex or demographic here) who might find other mobis difficult to use.
Voda’s big idea is that the phone doesn’t need fewer buttons, rather it needs more of them so the Simply has switches for everything from contacts to a ringer setting. They are all large, neatly labelled and generally pretty simple to use. The integrated voice mail service works in a similar way to a home answering machine; the message button will light up when a new message is received. To listen to messages the customer just needs to press the messages button
Voda has also kept the features- list to a minimum, so there are no fancy ringtones, no cameras and not even a MP3 player.
The models are set to go on sale this week and will cost £80 on pre-pay or free if you have a voda contract.
Incidentally Nokia is also rumoured to be working on a noddy phone.
