Symbian brand dropped by Nokia

Nokia has decided to dump the Symbian brand, renaming the latest version of its beleaguered mobile OS Nokia Belle.

A major partnership with Microsoft on Windows Phone and the general struggles of Nokia have seen Symbian slip slowly away - with handsets toting the OS officially being pulled from the US market in the summer.

And now Nokia has unceremoniously dumped the whole Symbian brand by renaming the Symbian Belle update Nokia Belle.

Fanfare?

"The all new Nokia Belle (previously Symbian Belle) user interface will soon be available for download to some existing smartphones and begin shipping with a selection of smartphones that are already on the market," Nokia stated on the conversations blog – which was spotted by Engadget.

With Nokia still working hard to crack the smartphone market and steal a little of the market back from the likes of Apple, the future is currently very much about the company's Windows Phone efforts.

Although the Nokia Lumia 800 was well reviewed we've yet to see if it's reached the heights that Microsoft and Nokia would have hoped for in terms of sales, next year is likely to see the launch of the flagship Nokia Lumia 900.

There's also talk of Windows Phone Tango – a lower cost version of the mobile OS from Microsoft that could bring a slew of cheaper handsets including devices from Nokia.