Following RIM, Nokia and HTC have publicized their responses against Apple concerning their mobile devices. Nokia’s response:

In general, antenna performance of a mobile device/phone may be affected with a tight grip, depending on how the device is held. That’s why Nokia designs our phones to ensure acceptable performance in all real life cases, for example when the phone is held in either hand. Nokia has invested thousands of man hours in studying how people hold their phones and allows for this in designs, for example by having antennas both at the top and bottom of the phone and by careful selection of materials and their use in the mechanical design.

HTC came to the defense of their Droid Eris by comparing the numbers. Pocket-Lint writes:

“Approximately .016% of customers,” Eric Lin, the company’s global PR and online community manager exclusively revealed to us before adding that “we have had very few complaints about signal or antenna problems on the Eris.”

Weighing in, it’s fair to say that you have to intentionally grip (pretty tightly) a Blackberry, an HTC Droid Eris, or a Nokia phone to have it drop bars. Where you could accidentally touch “the spot” on an iPhone 4, you have to try pretty hard to do it on competitors phones. I don’t think I’m being unreasonable – that’s my honest observation. I do think Apple reached a bit too far in trying to expose other smartphones – if it’s arguably a “non-issue” on the iPhone 4, why explore “non-issues” on other phones?

[via Engadget (Nokia) and Pocket-Link (HTC)]