On Monday,Apple announced iMessage, which is essentially a full IM client that happens to live inside your standard Messages app. The “BBM killer” causedRIM’s stock to sinkto its lowest level since 2007. Now, Nokia is fighting back andhas just announcedits own free messaging platform:IM for Nokia, which is an instant messenger program that allows you to send messages to anybody with the same app installed, as well as one or all of the following: Ovi Mail account,Google Talk, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo!...

Knowing that half the battle to get consumers using your phones is to offer an ecosystem that competes with its rivals, Nokia has begun tempting developers with promises of a free a Nokia E7 and Windows Phone 7 handset if they sign-up to itsLaunchpad developer program. Existing Launchpad members received an email from Nokia, which was subsequently forwarded toSlashgear, highlighting the Finnish mobile giant’s commitment to its developers and their applications....

With Nokia’s Windows Phone smartphones expected to launch in the coming weeks, details of what the Finnish mobile giant will include in its new handsets are starting to emerge after T-Mobile marketing posters leaked describing Nokia’s 3D mapping and voice navigation service called Nokia Drive. The posters, which were briefly displayed at an on-site shop at T-Mobile’s Bonn headquarters in Germany, were anonymouslysent to Winrumors, showing a new Nokia Windows Phone smartphone running Nokia’s recently launched Top App application and a new Media Center application, which looks set to replace Microsoft’s own Music hub....

Finnish mobile giant Nokia has announced it will cut as many as 3,500 jobs as it continues to adapt its market strategy and cut company costs associated with manufacturing, its Location and Commerce business and other “supporting functions”. In its press release, Nokia says that it will “take additional actions to align its workforce and operations” by adjusting its manufacturing capacity across Europe, closing its one of its factories in Cluj, Romania by the end of 2011, shifting output to Asian suppliers that “provide greater scale and proximity benefits”....

TNW Quick Hit: Today at the CTIA event, you cantrack our coverage here, Nokiatold Forbesthat it is planning on releasing CDMA Windows Phone 7 handsets in the future. In fact, according to Nokia, no Symbian phones will be released in the future that use CDMA. The functionality will wait on the release of WP7 Nokia devices. That implies that there will be no CDMA Nokia handsts of any sort until 2012....