Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

I think the CEO should go. While there is no doubt that 2008 was good for Nokia, given the dominant position that Nokia came from and then conceding the highly lucrative smart phone market (gross Margins c.45% vs lower end phones where margins are c.5%) to the likes of Apple (somewhat unavoidable), HTC, Samsung etc. (completely avoidable) was a big strategic blunder. Nokia came from and to a certain extent is still stuck in hardware is king mindset, similar to IBM of early 80s, whereas increasingly the smartphone market is moving to the concept that hardware is commodity and software is king.

I had to make such changes in a previous life where I had to completely change the business model of a company and had to reduce the headcount of the company from over 200 employees, most of whom were hardware technicians to c. 35, most of them software devs. It was painful but it was what ensured the survival of the company in the end. Unfortunately Nokia is in a similar position today and it is less the quality of their hardware and more the quality of their software and post sale support, which is abysmal at present, that would determine the company's future.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

the rumors about a new CEO is here again. The fact is Nokia themselfs has probadly nown the plans over a half year.

Please dont take this message as trolling and sorry for my poorr english. But how about this some speculation based on the fact that money decides the future most the times... I hope as hell I am wrong.

* Meego project will get dished. mainly because its a new os and to geekish for mainstream people.
* Instead they decide to use Winmobile7 on highend devices
* symbian on low/midend as now.

I am not an expert but thing is bussines as usual and licensing winmobile from microsoft could maybe save money for Nokia and it seems like most of the engineer at nokia prefar Symbian cause they now that OS for long and the small group of Meego developers well they will maybe loose theyr job == nokia saves some money.

Fact is this could be true:( also maybe thats why there isnt that mush talk/info about Meego at nokia the latest months... most the time we herrumors about new symbian phones :(

just my...

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

Well, if Nokia were not this big, Winmo or Android would make perfect sense. However, given the size of Nokia, it would be in their interest to create a long term differentiated offering, so Meego might not be dead. It would burn cash in the short term but most of it is already ready in the form of Maemo, so doesn't make sense to abandon it at this time, especially given that most people like the software on their N900s (I know it it buggy but fundamentally people like the capability of the software).

However, you could be absolutely right. The new CEO would be looking to make quick changes and Android/Winmo offers a great opportunity to do just that.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

How so? Let me know exactly how symbian is bringing nokia down. Please?

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

Put 3 phones next to each other with similar hardware design, Android, Symbian, iphone
ask 10 non-geeks to use the phone (mid 30's non tech workers) to do tasks such as
- make a call, answer a call
- use calender to make an appt
- add/edit/delete a contact
- create a playlist of music
- turn on/off bluetooth
- download a popular app (Shazaam)
- browse the photo gallery
- give marks on how "smooth" the UI is

Symbian is just too clunky when compared to the other 2 for everyday tasks for "average joe".

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

Which is probably why they're writing a new UI from scratch for Symbian^4, should be out on handsets H1 next year. That's when I'll judge whether Symbian is worth keeping. I'm optimistic, but at the same time a bit worried they might try to keep it too familiar with the older Symbian.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

Man, if only the N900 were ACTUALLY made with open-source friendly components so that it would be genuinely future-proofed by community support. :P

Yeah yeah, same old song but it's so much more truer with every new Maemo device, it seems, despite all the clarion assurances of MORE openness in the past.

It's not often that we agree--but for once, I'd concede to agreeing with everything you just posted. :) Except to say that I wouldn't mind Android being served up by Nokia, under current circumstances. With a new CEO--if he's aggressive enough about pushing quality and CUSTOMER SUPPORT (it seemed you might have implied it, but didn't mention it) and improved the brand--then I would agree and suggest they don't touch Android at that point and go from a renewed position of brand strength.

My opinion is that with the current regime and direction, Nokia is simply making motions not unlike the shifting of tables and chairs on a sinking ship.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo was never the natural successor of Nokia's previous CEO Jorma Ollila. When Ollila left his post in 2006, his second in command left as well. Jorma Ollila is now the Chairman on the Nokia board of directors and he seems to be the person in charge of looking for a replacement to OPK.

I agree with everyone who thinks that the direction of Nokia has been positive with the OS's and strategy, but the actual implementation has been very poor at parts. Such as various parts of the Ovi products (Music, Store, etc. etc.), but then again I think Ovi Maps has been a great sign of what it is like when they get it right.

Also the amount of time to bring products to the market after being announced has been ridiculously slow, even though Nokia promised two years ago at the Mobile World Congress that they are speeding up this process. The design of the products at Nokia has not been ground breaking lately. Nokia devices are very good quality in my eyes but there hasn't been much new innovation on the devices design side of the business.

We have seen in the PC - Mac laptop market how much design really matters and how much people want nice / sexy looking devices. Apple has managed there to take a good chunk of the market even with being much more expensive than the equivalent PC laptop.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

I know 10 non geeks who use symbian phones. they have 5230s aka nokia nurons. They have no issues doing every thing you mentioned. Took them all about 5 mins to learn. Maybe its a preference thing. BUT every one who uses symbian is not a so called geek. There are millions of em oit there.

Re: Nokia wants new CEO: Report
 

It's only when you compare the phone OS to the other 2 then you realize how antiquated the OS is. After using Maemo for a while, going back to Symbian is horrible...

Symbian works, but it cannot move Nokia forward into the future with the current UI design.