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Nokia has lifted the lid on the Lumia 520 at this year’s Mobile World Congress – and it’s clear that the Finnish giant has its sights set firmly on the budget smartphone sector. Following on from the reasonably-priced and rather excellent Lumia 620, the Lumia 520 offers even more bang for your buck, with an estimated retail price of around €139 (around £120).

Amazingly the Lumia 520 is rocking Windows Phone 8, the latest and greatest version of Microsoft’s mobile operating system. It also boasts a five-megapixel autofocus camera, 8GB of internal memory, microSD card support and a 4-inch touchscreen which is so sensitive it even works when you’re wearing a pair of gloves – a prime consideration during those relentlessly frosty mornings.

The handset also has access to the Nokia Music service, which allows users to stream the latest tunes to their headphones for free, and all the usual mapping and navigation tools that Nokia is famous for.

The catch? The Lumia 520 isn’t coming to Europe right away, but will be released in the Far East to start with before trickling through to other markets. However, with those kind of specs and that kind of price, we’re pretty confident it will be worth the wait – and it should make the 2013 smartphone war very interesting indeed.

Is this low-cost blower the one that could transform you from a Windows Phone doubter to a card-carrying advocate? Leave a comment below to let us know.