Comment by muuh-gnu | Hacker News Reader

Comment by muuh-gnu | Hacker News Reader

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> So do you want to be a big fish in a little pond

But how is this a little pond? Basically every other big player offering Android phones also offer Windows Phones. If Nokia starts making money with windows Phones, everybody else will also start making money with windows phones. If the pond grows, all other fish will also grow and consume the growing pond, so Nokias share will remain the same. The pond is only little as there is no money in it.

From all the other big players, only Nokia for some reason limited itself to offering only Windows phones. If they think their Android phones couldn't beat other Android phones, how exactly are their Windows phones supposed to beat other Windows phones? If they somehow can apply a magic formula to make Windows Phones a success, what hinders them from applying that same formula to Android?

Nokia didnt want to become just another Android manufacturer and get a small piece of the big Android pie, instead they've become just another Windows Phone manufacturer and will get a small piece of the small Windows Phone pie.

My interpretation as to why they went with Windows Phone:

1. The $$$, it's hard to turn down more than $1 billion dollars in a year (and probably more per device sold). Just makes the stupid gamble harder to turn down. 2. Nokia can still go with Android at anytime (and maybe they will once their exclusivity contract ends with Microsoft).

But $1 billion isn't really that much money for a company of Nokia's size (122,148 employees) when the company goes into a tailspin.

It's $8,187 per employee. That's 1-2 months of wages!

Yes, but if all things are equal, it's still enough money to fund the development of a new phone. Now, the question is all things are equal.

> But how is this a little pond?

Quick, find Windows in the chart: http://www.asymco.com/2012/02/21/the-opportunity-cost-of-win...

There aren't that many Windows phones available and as an example you won't find phones by Samsung, Motorola, Huawei, LG etc. And as the chart above shows what is out there isn't selling.

The rising tide lifts all boats arguments is correct, but there is a significant lead time in coming out with new phones. Last time I looked it was around 18 months, so new players jumping in will have a lag of around that much. There is first mover advantage.

Nokia's problem is execution, especially with software. Developing for two platforms (Windows and Android) wouldn't have made them any better at it. Better to concentrate your efforts in one place and succeed than spread and fail.

I do agree with your speculation as to the future - no matter what they do they won't get too far unless they fix their software development - and to a large degree the platform or how many of them doesn't matter that much except how much work they have to do.

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