A fresh setback for Nokia in the early days of its tablet strategy: it’s announced today that it has had to “temporarily delay” sales of its Lumia 2520 tablet in Europe amid a recall of the charger that is sold with the device, which it has found to be faulty. In the U.S., Nokia says sales of the travel charger accessory have been halted. Some 30,000 chargers are affected by the warning, including 600 travel accessories in the U.S.
The product in question here is a variant of the AC-300 charger, which is used exclusively with the Lumia 2520 tablet. Sales of the tablet have been halted in Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Russia, Switzerland and the UK. Nokia also says that users in those countries “are strongly advised to suspend use of the charger until further notice.” The same advisory applies to those who have bought the travel charger accessory.
Nokia explains the situation like this:
During an internal quality control process, Nokia identified a potential product quality issue that may potentially lead to a safety concern with certain AC-300 chargers, manufactured by a third-party supplier. Under certain conditions, the plastic cover of the charger’s exchangeable plug could come loose and separate. If loose and separated, certain internal components pose a hazard of an electric shock if touched while the plug remains in a live socket.
Jo Harlow says there have been no confirmed consumer incidents related to this. “While there have been no confirmed consumer incidents related to this potential quality issue, product quality and safety are top priorities at Nokia,” said the EVP of Smart Devices in a statement. “We apologize to the owners of the Lumia 2520, and we are working with urgency to minimize the inconvenience.”
The Lumia 2520, much leaked but officially announced in October 2013, has a tall order ahead of it to break through with consumer and business users. The general picture up to now has been that Microsoft — the platform upon which Lumia smartphones and tablets are built — is a distant third in the tablet market. Gartner figures for 2013 put Microsoft’s market share at 2.1 percent, equating to 4,031,802 devices sold. At the end of 2013, Android controlled the majority of the market at some 62%, with Apple at 36% of all sales.
Source: TechCrunch