Microsoft is officially announcing a massive brand change for its smartphones by dropping the Nokia brand, replacing it with "Microsoft Lumia".
Microsoft, the world's largest software developing company, had long been in the process of replacing the Nokia brand with a much simpler "Microsoft Lumia" for Windows Phone handsets. The software giant is now ready to go on the record with this change, starting with France. In a post on Nokia France's official Facebook page (Translated text), the company announced the account will soon be renamed to Microsoft Lumia.
"In the coming days, you will receive a message from Facebook about changing the name of this page. We are on the verge of becoming "Microsoft Lumia!" Stay-tuned for more soon," reads the post on Facebook.
The Redmond-based software company confirmed to The Verge that other social media accounts of Nokia France, including Twitter, will be rebranded to Microsoft Lumia. In addition to that, other countries will follow a similar renaming process in the coming weeks, the report added.
The rebranding wasn't entirely a secret. The software giant made notable changes to Nokia's native apps, such as Treasure Tag and App Social, in Windows Phone Store by removing the Nokia label completely in the recent months, PC World reports. The rebranding was widespread after some Nokia websites were redirected to Microsoft Mobile site.
However, Microsoft's decision to drop Nokia name from its smartphones does not affect the Finnish company's standalone operations. Nokia will continue to run the Here mapping service and network equipment without the phone business.
The current Lumia smartphones carry Nokia's logo at the front bezel and the back panel, but the rebranding will likely affect that. The latest Lumia handsets, the Lumia 730 and 830, are reportedly the last pair of smartphones to feature Nokia branding.
Microsoft is also planning another name change for its growing Windows Phone mobile platform. The software giant is planning to ditch the "Phone" part and just call it Windows, much in line with the company's plan to merge all platforms under a single Windows product.
