Stephen Elop's Nokia Adventure
businessweek.com
businessweek.com
That is because they have already won.
Very few people are buying WP7 phones at the moment (even though big manufacturers have put their weight behind it, think HTC, LG). What would make people buy Nokia phones with WP7? Its camera?
No, they have a bigger share of the pie, when measured in particular ways right now. It's a long game.
Also whether critic believe it or not but the TRIO (MS, Nokia and Skype) is a lethal combination in terms of innovation (if planned and executed well) - these 3 can create something very disruptive that Elop is talking about ...
It sounds to me like Nokia doesn't want to be "just another Android phone maker". They want to differentiate, and to do that they want Google to do more for them than their other partners (like Microsoft ended up doing). Google has little incentive to do that; Android is already a market success and doesn't need Nokia to make it one. From their perspective, the code is all up on the public repo, and Nokia can take it and release phones whenever they want without even asking.
So what exactly is arrogant or over-confident about Google not seeing a need to bend over backwards for Nokia?
"But Google was riding so high that it essentially refused to negotiate, offering no concessions to Nokia despite its global presence. Elop later told the Salo employees that Google "acted like they'd already won. Apple and Android deserve some real competition."
Pretty much he's saying Google acted like Apple in how it views everyone below them.
Sounds kind of fair of Google to not give Nokia special concessions their other Android partners don't get. Nokia could have used Android anyway, just without Maps and the Android market.
Without Google apps and Android Market, its hard to sell a phone. To make the requisite alternate software, it will take a year plus, all while parallelly developing hardware, might be a bit too much even for a huge company like Nokia especially seeing that they seem to lack software dev skills.
Two things:
1) Mango. The WP7 OS actually is probably better than Ice Cream Sandwich, and we'll see with iOS5, but certainly stonger than iOS4. The first rev of WP7 had tons of gaps. They closed pretty much all of them (except tethering) and added stuff others don't have.
2) Nokia still has some of the best phone designers in the world. It's just they had Symbian. Couple WP7/Mango with Nokia and you have fireworks.
This early in the game its dangerous to think you already won.
Also, why would Nokia bet on one horse, and not follow HTC's example of supporting both WP7 and Android?
I can give you a billion reasons. :-)
Seriously though, while Android is ahead -- even if Nokia doesn't win over a single Android user, there are more ppl getting smartphones for the first time next year than smartphone users in the world today (by estimates). That is the market is growing super fast.
So if WP7 can win just 20% of completely new customers. Customers who don't have Android or iPhone -- they'll be about 10% of the market -- and that assumes they win over no converts. If they can convert just 10% of iPhone/Android users that can get them to 15% market share. That's pretty good.
It's clear Nokia already tried negotiating with Google and Google was arrogant. I don't expect they'll go back to that well any time soon. And remember they're getting special treatment from MS -- and I don't discount the rumors. I think there is a acquisition possibly in the works. My hope though is we don't actually hear about it until mid 2012.
I can't help but suspect Microsoft needed Nokia more than Google (read: was willing to pay more for the deal), which was what caused the partnership.
Hey, we are hearing only one side of the story and this side is blaming others instead of taking responsibility.
Usually the people that use to blame others are the people to blame themselves.
Also by the time Nokia settles down with restructuring and market gaining, it wont be surprising if MEEGO also succeeds (even a little bit as Intel's power wont let it die easily) then Nokia will be the first one to join-in ... MEEGO by the way has very strong vision and it is the only platform that can threaten Apple and Google put together ...
This is Elop's interpretation of something probably different: He wanted Google to let them include binary code proprietary from Nokia and Google refused.
Oh, and the "negotiations talk" seems to imply that they wanted as much money from Google as they got from MS: Look, we are going to use WP7 if you do not pay us billions of dollars! we are super important, hurry up!!
Very well said ... i guess north-american critics sometime have difficulty in understanding emerging markets and the brands that are popular there - the power of those brands and the market itself is greater than the rest of the world combined ... whoever wins these markets (emerging and yet-to-emerge) will be the ultimate winner (in long term of course).
Sure, you might have gotten a big check from IBM and OS/2 Warp was technologically better than Windows 3.11, but that isn't enough to make it a smart business move. There is more to a mass market product than that.
Elop is now trying to make the best of a losing position, but he's too predictable and "corporate" to succeed in the smartphone market. He should have kept silent on the MS deal until he had a working WP7 model, then make the announcement -- give the press a story about a new wonderful gizmo, so that they won't talk about failure and layoffs. As it is now, by the time "Microkia" devices hit the market, share prices will be so low that any Gordon Gekko under the sun will be ready for a takeover.
"Elop's first stop is the research and development facility in Tampere, the town that houses most of the MeeGo engineers—many of whom left early as a sign of protest on the day the Microsoft deal was announced. After apologizing for the effect layoffs will have on many—Nokia announced on Apr. 28 that it would lay off 4,000 people by the end of 2012 and transfer 3,000 to Accenture (ACN), which will handle Symbian updates for existing models—Elop implores the attendees to wait before meeting with recruiters from Apple or Google."
so he has already decided to lay off thousands of people but wants them to wait till he actually swings the axe and they end up jobless before meeting recruiters? Iow "I plan to fire most of you but please don't try to get another job till I get around to it"
Maybe I am just reading this wrong (corrections welcome) but this makes no sense to me.
It makes sense because Nokia(as well as any company) would want to keep the best and fire the rest. The problem is that the best have an easier time being lured or hired, so no wonder Elop said what he said. It's just textbook style.
they didn't laid-off VP for fighting back but it was pre-planned & scripted by HR.
"Epic fail"? Is this really English to the the demographic that reads Businessweek?
"That upsets me—not because some of you are using iPhones, but because only a small number of people are using iPhones. I'd rather people have the intellectual curiosity to understand what we're up against."
Compared with this:
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/09/ballmer-makes-...
Then he put it on the ground and pretended to stomp on it, before walking away.
This kind of reminds me of a criticism of the US towards Afghan insurgents/OBL etc. That they conflate underestimating the opposition with loyalty.