Funklord | # 1511 | 2011-02-19, 15:34 | Report

Why would people have had to wait?
they could just use n900, symbian, android for now, and once meego was good and ready (1 year tops) they'd buy it then.

You probably don't realise how fast Nokia could introduce meego on the market and make a difference.
If they'd put meego on the same hardware platform as e63, they could be selling it with similar features as before, but a 1/3 pricetag.
The competition has nothing to counter this move with.
(Part of the impopularity of n900 is its price and general bulkiness)

One of the benefits of using a real linux distro, is the ease of porting it to other hardware.

ysss | # 1512 | 2011-02-19, 16:43 | Report

"Elops only responsibility is for the Microsoft stock he holds"

I think you meant to say "Elop's only responsibility is to Microsoft, due to the MS Share he has."

Questions:
1. Does MS exercise control over Elop because he owns MS share?
2. Will running Nokia down to the ground have a positive effect on MS share value? (so far the answer is no)
3. Does Elop, the already filthy rich b*@#tard, have other means to attain more personal gain (fame, fortune and glory) by doing good in Nokia than running it down to the ground?

Did you just say that generally developers know how to run multinational companies?

If Nokia is facing an imminent cashflow problem if they continue on their current course, given what we know about their techs (opensourced Symbian, thrown away maemo and also dabbled in opensourced MeeGo), a very thin profit margin on a big chunk of their business (mobile phone) and receding marketshare on the hot and growing segment (smartphone), please tell me 3 possible sources for cash infusion.

Please tell us how that's obvious; it's not obvious to me.

First off, I assume you're talking about public companies.
Second, pay/renumeration is a whole different can of worm to talk about. Suffice to say that you can't get it far cheaper unless you go to unproven candidates; and that's an even bigger risk to take when you talk about the kind of numbers these gargantuan companies are pulling in.

There are many ways to be profitable, and innovating is never the only way.

Please give a few examples of these small and innovative companies that you had in mind when you wrote that?

gerbick | # 1513 | 2011-02-19, 16:52 | Report

There was a new, purchasable MeeGo device already released?

I wasn't talking about the N900. I was talking about a properly released MeeGo device. It's not an officially supported device by Nokia for MeeGo despite being the baseline spec and hardware target for MeeGo.

Could have, would have, should have... didn't. Not even their own board thought they could have gotten the devices out.

Did it happen? Yes/No only.

When it works, yes. It just didn't happen.

Wiener | # 1514 | 2011-02-19, 17:36 | Report

Apple? Nokia joked about Apple iPhone a few years ago!
HTC? Samsung? LG? All of them were small in mobiles a few years ago. It's not only innovation, but you must -in particular in consumer electronics- anticipate trends ~ 1-3 years in advance. Nokia was only running behind the marked for years.

The problem is management of Nokia didn't get how much potential is in Maemo for future devices and visionary applications of all kind beyond Smartphones (that is lost for Nokia anyhow). Just think of future car2car networks, driving assistance systems, etc. Maemo has (had?) a good position in automotive applications - an interesting future market.

I agree that Nokia had to increase cashflow, and hence had to use additional platform (WP7, Android, whatever). However, Nokia might have just added these platforms without destroying existing ones (Symbian, Maemo). Just slowly reducing Symbian development and moving towards Maemo or WP7 would have been more safe and more visionary strategy. The value of the Nokia stock just reflects this issue.

ysss | # 1515 | 2011-02-19, 17:58 | Report

Thanks for playing But I'm guessing that your answers were a bit out of context to what funkord had in mind.

You're right that the companies you quoted were small/insignificant in the particular segment (smartphone) when they started, but as a whole they were already giant corporations with immense amount of resources.

Certainly not the 'small' that funlord was talking about.

I think Nokia (at least a good amount of well placed people there) GOT the zen/tao of open. They opened Symbian and they were pursuing maemo (then MeeGo) for quite awhile.

But both of those pursuit ended in financial disappointment.

Nokia had problem executing. Orrrrrr... making money out of FOSS is just too hard for big corps?

Lastly, you're right about the smooth migration; but they wouldn't have gotten a great deal from MS that way.

I really think MS gave them a ridiculously good deal (in financial terms; upfront cash, potential shared revenues, etc) to get them onboard crazy ballmer's train.

Wiener | # 1516 | 2011-02-19, 18:39 | Report

I don't think "open SW or not" has anything to do with the problems at Nokia. Nokia in the end sells phones. And missed the train called smartphone - even now there is no real smartphone that is comparable to recent Samsung with 4''+ AMOLED screen and so on. Or just lay the N900 beside an Iphone 3 or 4. You see the difference? I do. Ok, Symbian was a problem. But it could have been solved QUICKLY by replacing it with Maemo and in parallel offering WP7 or Android phones to customers without commiting to these platforms.

In the end, a sustainable deal must also work out in a few years. Will MS buy Nokia phones in 2012, 13, 14? I don't think so. Nokia managment does an old mistake by not following customer needs and wishes for a short-term benefit of maybe a bn.$. This is not much considering the fact that Nokia will have hard time selling its phones from now on.

nocain | # 1517 | 2011-02-19, 18:54 | Report

Ok let's try to do away with the existing conspiracy theories.
As much as I would have liked to have rather seen a partnering with RIM or hp/palm, those 2 platforms have little to offer nokia outside of sales, eg they they don't have a search or ad revenue system. So any partnering would have been little good to nokia for revenue generation.

This leaves MS, Google, and Apple. Apple is impossible to partner with I am sure we can all agree on this. Google doesn't need nokia it is already huge in the mobile area so it's not going to cut a deal for ad revenue sharing, and google has it's own mapping and gps software and it is damn good and well developed, so it does little good to offer up the navetiq for anything. This leaves MS who has always struggled in the mobile area, including partners willing to push it mobile tech to customers. now ms has a large search engine like it or not and has an ad revenue system, but their mapping and gps tech is weak and not well developed.

This is why the nokia ms deal makes some sence as both companies can gain something. Nokia has a large brand device marketshare and a strong European foothold, as well as some top notch mapping and gps tech. MS has the search engine and ad revenue as well as being deeply engrained in general the general corporate world. In short both can gain from a deal.

What doesn't make sence is the exclusiveness of the deal. I feel nokia undersold what they have to offer to MS. All dropping symbian and meego did was piss off current customers and developers. It also left them behind the curve if the MS re-entry fails as all previouse attempts have as they lost their core developer base and their core customer base as nokia is basically abandoning them. Also nokia is no longer seen as a pioneering company they become a OEM maker. Symbian won't be worth the effort to resurrect as it will be far behind the curve development and customer wise. Meego will be less likely to be as developed in the handset area or another company will have bought into it and will be heavily steering it.

The exclusiveness of the deal removes nokias ability to be flexible in the future or really viable to consumers and developers due to betrayal. You can't say hey our stuff is crap so we going to MS, and later turn around and be all MS stuff is crap so we using our stuff as you were just saying how your stuff is crap. It doesn't instill confidence.

Nokia could have pushed for the deal with MS just as it is now without the exclusiveness, they could have scaled back to symbian team from 3000, down to 1000, get meego team to 600, and formed a MS team of about 200-400. This would have made everyone happy and saved money and increased profitability. Only thing they might have lost out on in the MS deal is MS marketing moneys and some of the supposed WP customization and steering options.

Heck it's not like nokia couldn't roll an update out to all their devices relatively quick making bing the default search and integrate the windows ad stuff into them as well as nokias ovi maps to generate instant revenue to MS which nokia would get some percentage of.

Buisnesses seem to loose out on the concept of customers, piss them off and they leave to other options. They leave and the business revenue dries up and you cease to exist or you get bought out. This happens and stock isn't worth crap. MS does understand this which is why any market they enter they NEVER leave maybe go into a holding or maintenance pattern but they don't drop thier stuff until they can replace it with something else of theirs. This is why MS does get some loyal customers. Nokia should have taken note of this when penning this deal.

mishmich | # 1518 | 2011-02-19, 20:32 | Report

Just looking around at what is out there now, either available to buy or production models now being demonstrated at conferences. Featuring:

iPhone/iPad, Blackberry, HP/WebOS, Android 1.3/Honeycomb, Windows 7/WP7

And Nokia has what exactly?

Some legacy Symbian and a lot of vapourware that 'might' one day have hit a hight street store.

That's it folks, no point in arguing. Nokia missed the boat. Now they are into damage limitation, trying to recover what they can from the abortive experiment that didn't provide them with a platform for the next generation of mobile phones and tablets. Intel may well take advantage of MeeGo as an OS for tablets, etc. But that is it where Nokia is concerned - they backed the wrong horse, and they lost the gamble. As gamblers do, they are betting on another horse (WP7), in the hope they can recover some of what they lost on the last three-legged nag (Maemo/MeeGo).

End of story. No point complaining, arguing, etc. It is just a mobile phone company, and just a mobile phone, and just one in a long line of OS variants. that went nowhere. Get over it. I still think that Atari ST & TOS was a great system, way ahead of MS.DOS at the time - but we still ended up with Windows 3.1. Looking back, I was being silly - Apple & MS were always set to dominate the desktop.

Wiener | # 1519 | 2011-02-19, 20:47 | Report

You mean before the Microsoft deal. Did the deal change it? Symbian is more legacy, and the future is even more "vapourware".

True, unfortunately. Nokia management acted like a gambler in Las Vegas, or like some Wall street zockers. Anyhow, I don't own Nokia shares, only a phone thanks god.

Anyway, you're right. Nokia was just a phone company we loved, and will disappear like Atari or Commodore. Who cares. We'll likely end up with Apple and Samsung. Life goes on.

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PMaff | # 1520 | 2011-02-19, 20:56 | Report

?
http://imgsrv.gocomics.com/dim/?fh=9...389e4549fd1ffc
!

"Nokia will bring out a device this year on MeeGo, a high- end operating system it’s developing with Intel Corp., to gauge market reaction, Elop said. MeeGo engineers will then be shifted to work on innovations that can help Nokia leapfrog rivals. "
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-0...le-google.html

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Last edited by PMaff; 2011-02-19 at 21:13.