Nokia Ovi store open for business

Nokia is hoping to build an applications market place to rival Apple's

Nokia has entered the mobile applications business with the official opening of the Ovi Store.

The portal will offer a variety of applications to around 50 million customers worldwide, and users in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Russia, Singapore, Spain and the UK will be able to get billed by their network operator.

"Ovi Store is open for business and we've stocked the shelves with local and global content for a broad range of Nokia devices," said Tero Ojanperä, executive vice president of Nokia Services.

The Ovi Store is accessible via a downloaded application, and users will have to create a profile at the Ovi web site to use the service.

US users will be able to bill applications to the operator later this summer via AT&T.

"AT&T looks forward to introducing Ovi Store for our customers later this year," said David Christopher, chief marketing officer of AT&T mobility and consumer markets.

Nokia is hoping to build an applications market place to rival Apple's, but faces stiff competition from Microsoft and Sun. To stimulate developer demand Nokia opened up its mapping service that links with Ovi services.