W302, W595, W902: Three new Walkman® phones, with two supporting Java Platform 8 (JP-8)

On July 22, 2008, Sony Ericsson announced three new Walkman® phones - the W302, W595 and W902 - to coincide with the Walkman phone's third birthday. Since the launch of the first Walkman phone in 2005, the W800, Sony Ericsson has sold 77 million Walkman phones to date.

The W595 and W902 Walkman phones support Sony Ericsson's Java™ Platform 8 (JP-8), based on the Mobile Services Architecture (MSA) umbrella standard (JSR 248), and this takes the number of phones in this platform family to 17. The W302 supports nine JSRs.

W302, W595 and W902 in more detail

The Sony Ericsson W302 Walkman is a quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE phone packed with features in an affordable, no-compromise slim handset. In addition to offering the Walkman player, FM radio and TrackID™ track recognition, the W302 supports a range of JSRs and includes 3D gaming with both JSR 184 and Mascot Capsule version 4.

The W302 will be available in selected markets during Q4 2008.

The W595 Walkman is a HSPDA slider phone with music management using Shake Control and SensMe™, track discovery using TrackID and an FM radio. The W595 also includes a 320x240 pixel 262K TFT QVGA display, 40MB internal memory, extendable external memory using Memory Stick Micro™, a 3.2 megapixel camera and picture & video blogging. The W595 is based on Sony Ericsson's Java Platform 8 (JP-8) and joins the JP-8.3 sub-category.

The W595 will be available in selected markets during Q4 2008.

The W902 Walkman is also a HSPDA phone and is designed for a true multimedia experience with superior audio quality, 5.0 megapixel camera with 16x digital zoom, picture and video blogging and track discovery using TrackID. The W902 also includes a 320x240 pixel 262K TFT QVGA display, 24 MB internal memory and extendable external memory with Memory Stick Micro. As with the W595, the W902 is based on Java Platform 8 (JP-8) and joins the JP-8.3 sub-category

The W902 will be available in selected markets during Q4 2008.

Mobile Services Architecture (MSA) in 17 phone series
The announcement of the new W595 and W902 mean that MSA full set can now be found in 17 Sony Ericsson phone series. All JP-8 phones are based on MIDP 2.1 and have the same core JSR set based on the Java umbrella standard MSA (JSR 248).

Sony Ericsson's Java Platform 8 (JP-8) phones are organized in three sub-categories – JP-8 (8.0-8.2), JP-8 (8.3) and JP-8 (8.4). The addition of the new W595 and W902 expands the JP-8.3 sub-group to eight phones. JP-8.3 has some additional functionality supported by the Content Handler API (JSR 211) and Mobile Sensor API (JSR 256).

The Walkman phone timeline
Sony Ericsson has sold 77 million Walkman phones to date. Below is a timeline of key moments in the Walkman phone's history during the past three years:

August 2005: Sony Ericsson launches its very first Walkman phone – the W800
December 2005: Three million Walkman phones sold to date
April 2006: Sony Ericsson launches its first Walkman phone music accessories; MPS-60 portable speakers, which goes on to sell millions of units worldwide
October 2006: Sony Ericsson launches its first slider Walkman phone – the W850 which also introduces the unique TrackID music recognition application
November 2006: Sony Ericsson launches the W950 Walkman with the biggest storage yet - 4GB
December 2006: 20 million Walkman phones sold to date
February 2007: Sony Ericsson launches its slimmest Walkman phone - the W880
November 2007: W910 Walkman phone with Turbo 3G/HSDPA launches as a complete entertainment device
December 2007: Walkman phone sales hit 57 million
February 2008: Sony Ericsson launches the W350, with Walkman on top and W380 with gesture control
July 2008: W980 Walkman phone with clear audio experience launches