Senior market focused device maker Doro updated its smartphone and feature phone lines, which will also see the wider rollout of its Connect and Care service.

The company’s new smartphone, Doro 8030, claims to feature a “unique and revolutionary” user interface designed to focus on actions.

“Effectively it’s like a really easy mode of Android. It has big icons, it makes the most used icons available to you, it simplifies the menu structures, to make the smartphone very simple,” Chris Millington, managing director at Doro UK and Ireland, told Mobile World Live.

Doro highlighted research which said that smartphone ownership among seniors is now nearing 40 per cent, and this figure will continue to increase through 2016, with 60 per cent of those aged 65+ intending to purchase one at next upgrade.

But the company is not turning its back on the feature phone segment.

“Just because the feature phone market is declining, it doesn’t mean ours is. Because obviously the senior market is different, and those that don’t want a smartphone, don’t want a smartphone,” Millington said.

The company announced three 3G feature phones, 6520, 6525 and 6530.

The line features a clamshell form factor, with the two highest spec devices featuring an external display. And the senior focus of the feature phones does not mean that online services are out – Facebook and Twitter support are on board, along with email client and web browser.

The top device, 6530, also includes GPS, meaning it can support Doro’s Connect & Care service – described as a “widely accessible first step toward a truly mobile consumer telecare offering”.

The service allows a network of friends and family to be contacted when the user needs help – for example with shopping or transport.