Nokia's Windows Tablet Project On Hold?

NEW YORK (TheStreet) - Can Nokia (NOK)-manufactured Windows 8 tablets compete with Microsoft's (MSFT) Surface? Nokia CEO Stephen Elop seems to think so. Will they? That's another story.

As a matter of public record, Elop recently stated that a Nokia tablet has great potential. Producing the tablets, he added, is of great interest to the company.

But now he may be backtracking a bit, telling The Verge that his company's still considering touchscreen PCs but is now "monitoring the dynamics" of producing such a device. He believes Nokia still has enough unique ideas about how to deliver a tablet which can compete in tomorrow's marketplace.

Currently, Nokia and Microsoft are tight partners when it comes to developing and making handsets which run on the Windows Phone 8 platform. But when it comes to tablets, Microsoft makes and sells these new Surface devices under its own brand name.

If Nokia were ready with a tablet of its own we probably would have heard about it from this week's Mobile World Congress taking place in Barcelona. Instead, Nokia announced new mid-priced and low-priced Lumia smartphones, as well as two new feature phones for developing markets. Those markets continue to provide Nokia with a steady stream of willing customers.

--Written by Gary Krakow in New York.

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Gary Krakow is TheStreet's senior technology correspondent.