End User: Nokia N96 Bruce Lee Edition Hits China

Nokia N96 Bruce Lee Edition Hits China

by Tom Milnes on November 20, 2008

Nokia's N96 was announced at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and has been available in Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere for a few months, but in a world market swamped with smart devices how does a manufacturer ensure that its latest must-have device makes an impact? Generally with a bucket load of features and decent marketing. The US version of the N96 has all the features you could need including music, maps, photo, Internet and Amazon.com video on demand functionality (nice!), but the Chinese version just released has simply taken its marketing to eleven with the Bruce Lee edition.

Complete with phone, an action figure, photos of the Dragon himself, an autographed case, miniature nunchucks and more, this limited edition item is for the Hong Kong market only, but apparently can be purchased here for 8,788 Yuan (about $1,200). Make sure you are confident in your Chinese before plopping down anything. Frankly, I've never seen anything quite like this marketing outside of the the realm of video game Collector's Editions, which always come with additional items. Then again I've never been to Hong Kong. It could be that this run of the mill there, but I doubt it. There is a Chinese website associated with the Bruce Lee model. Unfortunately I've not been able to get it to load properly. Maybe you will have better luck. Regardless, good stuff this, with collectible written all over it. If Nokia is smart they will expand this to the world market.

If you can't access the site linked to above, check out the You Tube video below of a Bruce Lee, or perhaps a Bruce Lee impersonator, taking on a pair of ping-pong experts with his nunchuks. No face shots here, so I'm guessing this is a fake, but impressive skill with the bamboo as well as as viral marketing nonetheless.