HTC scored no points with Nokia today as it announced its new smartphones, the Desire HD and Desire HD Z, at a press conference in London that conflicted with Nokia’s annual conference taking place in the same city.

At a press event in London, HTC unveiled what are essentially the European versions of the HTC Evo 4G. The Desire HD features most of the same features as the Evo, and the Desire Z features a pop hinge that opens to reveal a qwerty keyboard.

The Desire HD features a 4.3-inch LCD display, 1 GHz Snapdragon processor, 720p HD video recording, 8-megapixel camera with dual-flash and the same unibody heritage of the HTC Legend, which is sculpted from a block of solid aluminum. It also includes the new HTC Fast Boot, which is supposed to shorten the time taken to complete the power-up sequence.

HTC Desire Z includes a few downgrades from the Desire HD. The Z features 720p HD video recording, a 5-megapixel camera with automatic flash, an 800MHz Qualcomm 7230 processor and HTC Fast Boot.

The Desire HD and Desire Z will be broadly available through mobile operators and retailers across major European and Asian markets in October, with the HTC Desire Z shipping in North America later this year.

While HTC was showing off the Desire devices, Nokia was apparently fuming. According to reports from Tech Crunch, Nokia was bothered enough by HTC’s conflicting press event, which HTC scheduled just weeks before the kick-off of Nokia World, that it sent people carrying red balloons to stand outside the entrance of HTC’s event. The balloons bore the message, “I know where I’m going with Nokia’s Ovi Maps.”

To add even more venom to the statement, Nokia handed out HTC press event “survival kits,” to those who were leaving Nokia World to attend the HTC event. The kits included such items as ear plugs and an eye mask, “in case you feel snoozy.” The Nokia survival kits included a message that noted HTC stands for “Ham, Tomato & Cheese (not the most exciting) sandwich.”

When reached for comment, a Nokia spokesman pointed to a tweet posted on Nokia’s corporate Twitter account, which read: “HTC drives buses up to our front door to hijack #nokiaworld – so we give out red balloons plus lunch…and u call us “dirty”!? LOL!”

Indeed, more than one outlet reported that HTC sent transportation to the Nokia World event to draw reporters to its event. It’s worth noting that Nokia’s event was scheduled a year ahead of time, and HTC scheduled its event only weeks ago.

HTC could not be reached for comment on the matter before press time.

BT (NYSE: BT) is back with another attempt in the mobile market. The UK’s largest fixed line operator and former incumbent launched a new mobile package today, BT Total Broadband Anywhere, which gives customers broadband at home and on their mobile, as well as a choice of two Blackberry-style smartphones from Taiwanese handset maker HTC starting at ?23.99 ($27) per month. The service allows consumers to make mobile calls off Wi-Fi connections at home and at BT hotspots around the country. It switches to Vodafone’s network when neither of these two options is possible. In 2001, BT was forced to spin off its mobile division BT Cellnet (later rebranded as O2 and acquired by Telefonica) to satisfy the regulators, and tried to re-enter the market with its BT Fusion product. But the service was a disappointment, attracting only 45,000 subscribers in three years. Meanwhile, BT has watched as mobile networks have begun entering their market, with Vodafone (NYSE: VOD), Orange and O2 all offering a home broadband product. [release].

Another handset manufacturer turning to the mobile internet to boost sales. Today, at a splashy launch at the smart Soho Hotel in London, Peter Chou, president and CEO of Taiwanese handset maker HTC, declared 2008 the year of the mobile internet as he brandished the company’s latest device, the HTC Touch Diamond, which promises one touch access to a number of features, including the mobile web, photos and music among others, but will in most consumers’ eyes appear to be another iPhone knock-off.

That’s not to say the handset, which runs on Windows Mobile latest 6.1 version, isn’t a worthy contender. The device sports a 3D user interface, a 2.8 inch display that allows users to zoom in on content with the touch wheel or tilt it by turning it on its side, is a mere 11.5 mm thick, making it even thinner than the iPhone, and includes a 3.2 megapixel camera and 4 GB of storage. The handset’s designers were challenged with building a device that would be worthy of a place at the Museum of Modern Art and be instantly recognizable from across the street. They did this by creating an uneven surface of diamond shaped panels on the back of the phone. It certainly is recognizable, though it’s a matter of personal taste whether its MOMA-worthy. More importantly, it beats the iPhone in the speed department, and runs on HSDPA networks.

The company obviously has high hopes for the Touch Diamond, which it claims has been in the works starting in November 2006 and launches in Europe and Asia in June. HTC’s Chief Innovation Officer Horace Luke believes the device could help the company gain market share, and pointedly told Moconews that it was the company’s “culture of innovation” that separated it from the struggling Motorola (NYSE: MOT). Will it be able to set itself apart from the iPhone and the growing number of iPhone killers on the market? HTC has done a good job securing a number of operator deals, having worked closely with them to tweak the phone to their liking. In the UK alone, the phone will launch with all five of the country’s biggest networks. Orange, which was at the launch as a partner, says it plans to roll out the phone across all 27 of its country markets.

Still, its not hard to see how the HTC Touch Diamond and the growing number of credible iPhone knock-offs, such as the Samsung Instinct, steps up the pressure on Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) to innovate even further, and possibly even to reconsider its distribution model. Earlier today, news surfaced that Apple was not doing its usual exclusive deal in Italy, and had signed agreements with both Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) and Telecom Italia to carry the iPhone. No details have emerged on what this means for the fat revenue share Apple usually wrings from operators to get the iPhone. But rumors have been bubbling up that Apple’s European operators have not been happy with the way the Cupertino-based company bosses them around. France’s Orange was said to be more than annoyed with Apple’s insistence that they cut prices to boost sales—though the network would be eating the loss. Finally, Apple is obviously not Motorola, but it’s still an important point to note that Motorola was, in part, brought to its knees when LG (SEO: 066570) and Samsung quickly trotted out knock-offs of its hit handset the Razr.