NTT DoCoMo, the largest mobile operator from Japan, announced the release of Nokia FOMA NM705i, prepared to hit the market this month. FOMA NM705i is a candybar phone created by Nokia especially for the Japanese market and there are little chances that other countries will get it too, even though the handset was spotted at FCC at the end of 2007.

Nokia FOMA NM705i measures 105 x 46 x 15 millimeters, weighs 89 grams and brings features that place it in the mid to low-end range. Being a FOMA phone, NM705i is 3G-enabled and packs a 2.0 inch TFT display with a resolution of 320 × 240 pixels, a 1.9 Megapixel CMOS camera with 4x digital zoom that can offer average-quality photos, plus a secondary front camera for video calls.

Other specs of the Japanese Nokia include Media player (MP3, eAAC+, WMA and M4A supported), 2.5mm audio port for headphones and earphones, FM radio tuner, English-Japanese dictionary (81,000 words), Japanese-English dictionary (166,000 words) and microSD card support for boosting the internal memory. The handset can provide about 5.5 hours of talk-time and 210 hours of stand-by time.

Nokia FOMA NM705i will be available exclusively from NTT DoCoMo in three colors: bitter orange, stylish black and noble white for a price that has not been disclosed yet.

Despite the fact that it's the world's largest handset manufacturer, with a 40% market share, Nokia doesn't have a strong presence in Japan, firstly because the country has its own producers (Toshiba, Sharp, NEC, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Panasonic and Sanyo) that know better how to answer consumers' needs. However, on a long-term basis, Nokia intends to become one of the first mobile brands in Japan too. Besides FOMA NM705i, the Finnish company also announced its N95 flagship phone for SoftBank (to hit the Japanese market in April 2008) and will surely come with other devices in the future.