Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NOK), Microsoft Corporation (MSFT): A Lumia Watch?

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) and Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) are pretty much joined at the hip these days, especially in the smartphone sector (why don’t they just get together and become one, already?), with the Lumia line of handsets gaining some momentum while running on the Windows Phone 8 operating system. While Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) skidded into a ditch in its latest comeback bid (posting disappointing unit sales and a quarterly loss in its most recent earnings report), Nokia and Windows Phone have clearly assumed the No. 3 smartphone ranking in the U.S.

While rumors have been swirling that Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) was preparing to delve into the megaPhone market fairly soon (perhaps directly on the heels of the release of Windows Phone 8.1 with its upgrades to support 1080p full HD and larger screens than what are found on current Lumia handsets), the big craze nowadays has been focused on smartwatches. It is already running rampant that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. are working on their versions of smartwatches, and Sony is currently about to roll out its third version of such a device, but there has been very little to suggest that Microsoft was going to jump into the fray.

At least, until now. Suddenly this week, a new render has popped up about a device being called the Lumia 1080 by Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) that seems to be a smartwatch that would run on the Windows Phone 8.1 operating system. The render  seems to indicate a rather clumsy-looking device, but what specs are being mentioned it would seem to be an impressive  item to fit on a wrist. The Lumia 1080, if it in fact exists, would boast a very large 5-inch OLED plastic screen, full 1080p HD resolution, a 2,500-mAh battery and 2 GB of RAM. It would supposedly be powered by a 1.8-GHz quad-core processor (all of the Lumia handsets to this point have run on dual-core CPUs).

Of course, what we are talking about is just a rendering of such a device, if Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) were actually working on such a thing. Would you think this looks feasible as a device? What do you think a key Nokia investor like billionaire fund manager Jim Simons (portfolio) would say?

The rendering looked more like a smartphone with a wrist strap rather than an actual watch device, which we would expect would probably be smaller than a 5-inch display would demand, but who knows? Renderings are usually a very preliminary sketch for a device that does not actually exist yet, and here are renderings made of a lot of products that wind up not seeing the light of day. What do you think? Aside from the rendering itself, do you think Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) should delve into the world of smartwatches? Do you think the Windows Phone can be a good OS for this type of device? How do you imagine it being used? Give us your thoughts in the comments section below.

DISCLOSURE: None