Re: The black sheep now is Nokia Corp.For Chinese players, the trend seems different for the likes of ZTE and Huawei who are investing heavily in the handset division. With a low manufacturing cost, these players were quickly able to gain market share, especially now that delivering handsets became much easier (with Android available for all OEMs).
Instead, companies are turning to "less volatile" industries where they do stand a chance. Looks at Siemens, years ago, when it reverted back to its very traditional business and heavier industry (nuclear reactor for example).
Re: The black sheep now is Nokia Corp.So what is it about the network infrastructure business that makes sinking companies grab onto it like a life preserver? The profit margins? It sure can't be the painfully long sales cycles.
Re: The black sheep now is Nokia Corp.Nokia is treading a well-worn path.
Ericsson, Nortel, Siemens, Alcatel, Motorola, and AT&T/Lucent all sold off their handset divisions and held onto their networks business.
Nokia were lucky to have Microsoft take their business off their hands. Interesting that they're staying in the mapping game. Then again, they paid more for Navteq than they got for their devices unit.
Nokia Sells to MicrosoftFor folks who have been involved in the mobile devices business for a long time, this is almost like watching a species go extinct. Darwin's theory of evolution is at play here - only the fittest ones that can adapt and evolve will survive. Motorola Devices suffered the same fate some time back.
Nokia disasterQuantity is only one factor to consider. While Nokia may have outpaced Apple in sales (for whatever year it was that you cited) the quality of the product, its longevity, sustainability and innovation is what proves to be a leader. Yes, they had smartphones but the iPhone was THE game changer. Never heard of anyone waiting in line for a Nokia....right? Now everything is measured against the iPhone. Can't compare what Nokia delivered against the likes of Apple and Samsung. Nokia's big differentiator now is a 41megapixel camera phone. That may be a great camera but not the smartest phone.
Re: Feature phones?Does it though? Nokia was not responsible for 100% of the WP sales and do you really think that HTC and Samsung are going to continue to sell WP? Microsoft was already seeing their market share percentage drop and this will cause another hit to it.
Microsoft is also going to see competition from Jolla (Saildfish), Ubuntu and Firefox. They have shown that they cannot compete with Android and Apple and could barely beat BB. Nokia is also free to start selling phones again 30-months after the deal closes. They can also license their patents to anyone they want as well. What made Nokia great was their hardware and their patents and now that is not going with the devices division. Nokia sued HTC over an HD microphone. Now they can freely license that and that is one less "feature" that Microsoft has to differentiate its phone from the others. The market has spoken and it has aid no to WP time and time again. As for what took this deal so long; with Balmer retiring and his approach being to shove Windows everywhere, he wants to make sure that still happens after he leaves. So, by buying Nokia that keeps that up. Look at how Microsoft has done with Windows RT! Like they are going to do any better with a device division now. How many companies will look at doing another Windows RT tablet now!
Google can get away with offering their own devices; Microsoft is no Google. They are trying to compete with their partners and that is never a good way to do business. Microsoft needs them more than they need Microsoft.
Nokia, for so long the mobile handset market leader, has been struggling for several years, having failed to embrace the smartphone revolution early and aggressively enough."
Embrace the smartphone revolution? Where did you ever come up with that? The sold smartphones long before Apple ever even started to think about a mobile phone. Look at the Communicator series and how far they date back. That was one of the very first smartphones sold. While Apple was selling less than 40 million iPhones a year, Nokia was selling more than 130 million smartphones.
The Device Ain't RightSeems to me that two wrongs aren't going to make it right. Both have failed miserably over the years one at retaining share and the other entering the mobile market. While having a clear lead over BB - which isn't hard at this point - the jump to the next level is significant and will take the innovation of an Apple or Samsung to do something like that. I just don"t see that happening. That said, third place ain't a bad position to be in at this point in time.
Re: Feature phones?This places Microsoft firmly into third place and another nail in BlackBerry's coffin. Which begs the question, what took them so long?
The black sheep now is Nokia Corp.It is funny to think that, not only 5 years ago Nokia was the handset leader, but also to think that not long ago NSN was the black sheep of Nokia Corp.
Now NSN is Nokia (apart from the other two smaller parts).
Think about also that Ericsson (prior to Sony-Ericsson) was a major player in the handset division, and now they're gone from that market but kept their leadership in the infrastructure and carrier services area. Maybe that's the fate of both scandinavian companies.
Alcatel also has always had a smaller handset division that never took off.
On the other hand we have the chinese ZTE and Huawei making strides in both infrastructure and handset divsions. Will they fail also in the handset division?
Instead, companies are turning to "less volatile" industries where they do stand a chance. Looks at Siemens, years ago, when it reverted back to its very traditional business and heavier industry (nuclear reactor for example).