A couple of months ago, Swedish startup Jolla went to Indiegogo to launch a crowd-funded campaign to build a tablet that runs on its own Sailfish OS. After a few weeks in hiatus, the company is back on Indiegogo with some details about the slate’s hardware.

As earlier reported, the device will have a 7.85-inch display with a resolution of 2580 x 1536 pixels. But this time around, the tablet will have a bigger storage – 64GB, which is up from 32GB on the original device.

Other notable features of the Jolla tablet include a laminated display, built-in gyro and compass and a 4450mAh battery. The Swedish company is also giving its backers a special price of $250 for the slate.

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Sailfish OS hasn’t really taken off as much as Jolla had hoped. In fact, the Finnish company (which is composed mostly of former Nokia employees) had previously made their OS side-loadable with Android possibly to help improve its consumer reception.

But its previous move to make Sailfish OS compatible with Android apps doesn’t mean that it’s completely crossing over to Google.  Today, Jolla started rolling out Update 8 to Sailfish called Tahkalampi, which improves the operating system’s user interface.

Some of the new features included on Tahkalampi involve the following

• Easily switch between open Android apps in the homescreen by tapping on their respective active covers i.e they are no longer grouped into one cover (experimental 1)
• Add shortcuts to webpages in the app launcher area
• Set separate synchronization schedules per mail account
• Upload multiple files via Browser and be able to filter files by file type during file selection
• Define email signature and sender name per account
• Save unsent messages as drafts when messages app is pushed to background
• Search word auto-completion in Jolla Store
• Use stroke input method for writing in Chinese
• Define an end date when creating/modifying recurring calendar events
• Artist search support in Media player

The update will be available initially to Jolla owners with “The First One” covers with roll out scheduled for other users shortly after.If you've already received the update, give us some feedback in the comments section below.

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Last Friday, the Finnish company Jolla started to put its Jolla smartphone in retail stores in its home country at a €399 price tag. Although the smartphone runs on the company’s Sailfish OS, which is actually an offshoot of Nokia’s Meego OS, Jolla has built the device to be compatible with a large number of Android applications through its Yandex Store.

Today, the company’s CEO Tomi Pienmaki announced that it will also make its Sailfish OS compatible to Android phones. According to his statement in a Finnish website, the company is considering the possibility of distributing its Sailfish OS as an installer that will let users to sideload the operating system onto their smartphones.

Pienmaki also cited that it is already a practice in China where people are downloading new software from various distribution websites and then installing the downloaded operating systems on older devices. And Jolla is planning to employ the same strategy for Sailfish OS.

Moreover, he confirmed that the company is planning to rely on its applications, services and advertising for generating profit, instead of selling the OS itself.

There’s no timeline on when the company plans to implement this cross-platform approach, but nonetheless, the mere fact that Jolla is willing to make its own OS available to Android users shows really how powerful Google’s product has become. And it’s very interesting how this would affect markets in the future. We guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

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Finnish startup Jolla announced today that its Sailfish OS is now compatible with Android software and hardware.

According to the press release, Sailfish OS users will now be able to take full advantage of the Android ecosystem by allowing specific apps including Instagram, WhatsApp, Spotify and WeChat to work with the operating system. The company says the apps will be available for download from various app stores globally, although it failed to mention, which specific app stores it will be.

Related Story: Jolla Unveils Its First Smartphone, Priced at €399

Moreover, the OS will now be compatible with common Android hardware, specifically smartphones and tablets. This will enable manufacturers of Android devices to easily and conveniently make phones for Jolla as the current hardware they are using will also now work with Sailfish OS. The company aims to use Android’s massive user base in order to get Sailfish to appeal to a bigger user base.

Jolla also announced a new batch of Sailfish phone pre-orders this week, for Finnish customers who still want to get their hands on the Jolla phone. 

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Finnish startup company Jolla has announced today that it will be unveiling its first smartphone and that the company will have a “Pre-Sales Campaign” to take payments from fans ahead of launch.

The company has previously showcased its Sailfish OS a few weeks before on a Nokia N-series developer phone. It has yet to introduce its own phone so this time around the focus is more on the physical design of the phone and on its hardware.

The company is also planning to kick off a “pre-sales campaign” wherein customers can pay in a “kickstarter-style” program to get the phone earlier or get a few special extras compared to people who will buy the phone later. Moreover, Jolla will receive payments from customers and provide them with various options for a more “tailored” phone.

Whether or not it’s a kick-starter campaign, it can’t be denied that the inflow of resources through this marketing strategy will definitely help Jolla in terms of production and funding, in case the company wants to go head-to-head with bigger names in the industry, including its former mother company – Nokia.

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