Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Even if I agree with some of above: The stockholders and many people who buys phones doesnt care about it.

For the stockholders MONEY is the only intresting things atleast for the big players.

But if we in the OSS community , for example, want to Meego to succes we need to contribute! send bugreports and so on to make it clear for the new CEO that we want that OS in the future nokia phones!

If N9 fails with Meego they ma go for another crappyOS inststead (maybe win7)

So its not only the CEO that is decides Nokias future its the developers, buyers and Meego to succes.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

I thought OPK resigned from the board too.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Re: American vs Canadian :)

I can just see Stephen Colbert announcing that, "We got an AMERICAN as the CEO of the Finnish company, NOKIA!" Standing up and prancing, baloons falling, confetti flying, American flags fluttering, "WE DID IT!!!"

Finally settling down, "That's right, America! We finally got someone from our very own 51st state of Canada to take over!"

Too funny. :)

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Damn a Canadian, awesome indeed. Hope it brings more phones to North America. Plus his stint at Juniper Networks and Microsoft means he has connections inside the big US carriers ... this should make Nokia's entry into the North American market that much easier.

The Meego initiative has to much invested in it, and the plans are nearly at completion ... their is little he can influence the hardware and OS at this point ... something he hints at in the press conference when he says there are products we haven't seen yet. What he can influence is the marketing, the launch event, and the services surrounding such a hardware.

OPK had great plans, and the roadmap is a great one that foresees the future Nokia direction into Software/ Service/ and Hardware combined. His failing was that the changes took too long, and the misfires were too frequent. A Symbian Nseries still to be launched goes against what they planned early in 2009, and this production cycle of delays and extensions was getting ridiculous. A software guy like Mr. Elop should bring with him the talent to moves things within the company. Also as an outsider, he can finally fire without hesitation those who do not deliver performance in the management positions.

As a Canadian I would say we share much in the hospitality and niceness as the Finnish people do as well. I think a Canadian with this much experience compliments Nokia's work culture and should add the flare of what is required to compete in the North ... an angry beaver is a Canuck. Also from the press conference he looks very comfortable presenting something OPK did not look confident in. So I hope he is a more vocal than OPK was, and I hope Nokia is more responsive towards it's customers by having a more forthcoming and insightful CEO. Not having an accent is a good thing too in the North American market, because you can communicate without looking like a foreigner (I know sad part of life especially when we should respect someone who can probably speak more than 3 languages).

Anyways these are my viewpoints and we will see the fruits of his labor in Jan. once the transitory period ends and a new fiscal year begins.

I wanted to add that a CEO needs to get approval for dramatic changes from the board of directors. So no big suprises like a Win7 Nokia phone ... although I would love to see Nokia diversify and make an aXXX series, a wXXX series in addition to the current Meego nXXX series (a-> for an android line, w-> for win7 line). We can only dream on that one ... and make the phones compatible to all OS's ... you just buy the License or the OS installer from Nokia (a Service they can sell).

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

That remains to be seen.

I'm sure Kallasvuo thought Nokia would/could hold on to the Symbian developers (prior to smart touchphones a noticeable force) while they are still relevant and rebuild Symbian into a competitive or even cutting-edge system/UI/tool set...

Yet economies of scale are moving down the food chain (ie. sometimes larger displays become cheaper than smaller legacy versions etc.), users' (and developers') expectations grow, aggressive bet-the-house roadmaps see "unexpected" delays and so forth.

In a years or two years time when the supposed New Symbian is expected to start shipping, what will the value of Kallasvuo's bet into the Old Symbian be?

Did Nokia really need to buy them? Was totally redesigning clunky Old Symbian (and maintaining great deal of compatibility??) better than simply using it and fixing it around the edges while putting the real development muscle behind something that is ideal for today (and the future too)?

Is even the brand still worth anything? To us mindless consumers, or to developers?

Does everything have to be "invented in-house"? (see NIH syndrome).

Did Kallasvuo have a fixation with legacy software (SYMBIAN!) and legacy hardware over more innovative approaches? (PHONES, and the clunkier the better ;-)

Did Kallasvuo ever communicate with anyone? Deities know that he wasn't reaching out - or being reachable - to our little neglected community. We had nothing to offer him apparently, at least in terms of ideas or opinions.

He's probably a very decent bloke (and now rather wealthy too, for some reason), but he may always have been better suited to remaining a middle manager in some more boring field. What was Ollila thinking in the first place??


But back to the new topic at hand... Reggie's link to Elop's interview was quite informative, both in scary and encouraging ways.

For better or worse, Elop(er)'s no Kallasvuo.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Well, I am sure Intel does not stop developing Meego, or orther developers, so there will be Meego-phones available.
If the Meego-devices are not done by Nokia, so what. If Nokia does not want to provide devices to that niche, it's their lost.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

I finally watched it. You know, it could be interesting. He seems to understand where things are going for the enterprise, lets see what he can do for the consumer-side of things.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Or the opposite could happen.

• Nokia n8 has sales fails to sells enough units.
• MeeGo suffers the same fate that had an excellent OS that lacks devices and applications people want .
• Symbian 4 fails to impress.
• Nokia makes a Android phone and lose money from software services.
• Ovi discontinued.
• Nokia acquired by Samsung.

Ok I'm exaggerating little bit but Nokia getting a new ceo could be new life for Nokia or the death of Nokia.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Transparency.

If he could instill a sense of transparency through different layers of the company, then the rewards for all - developers, staff, customers & stakeholders could be very positive.

See the problems, move sharply and thoroughly to correct them, then reflect publically about the new path he is leading them on >

I did want the job but suprisingly they did not call ...

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Cycling through CEO's (particularly as a result of bad circumstances)... isn't that a sign of a company that is about to go under? I remember seeing that a LOT during the dot-com bubble burst. Either way, he'd better hurry up...

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/...ot-by-2014.ars

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

forget Motorola & Android - it's all about Snoop & Android.

great stuff.

who produced that then, Eric, Sergey or Larry ?

my money is on Schmidt ..

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Apologies for not going through the entire thread but just wanted to put my few paisas.

On a new North American CEO, I was expecting this thing to happen. Even I had commented the same on one of Texrat's famous blog article (about OPK). Nokia needed a showman to change the mindset of these american people and Stephen seems to fit this role.

If you have seen the interview and introduction of Stephen Elop, it shows clearly that he is talkative kind but with credible successes too in his career. He can be that showman which Nokia needs.

Also, not to forget the contacts he brings in the North American region.

The decisions will still be taken by the Board (mostly Finnish - and this is what we want too, right) and they ask Stephen to promote their products. I am very sure Stephen gets this and he will get his job done well too.

Btw, on a side-note, Nokia had recently (I think just last week) won as the "Most Trusted Brand" in India consecutively for a 3rd year in a row. One more year and it breaks the record in this country ("Colgate" has won 3 years in a row too). So, we did't need a new CEO. Finnish are known to be honest and straight-forward and it seems that we liked them.

Now back to the main point. Board will probably not like Stephen to touch too much into these markets (Asia/Europe). His job is very clear. Get the mind share in North America.

Wait to see this happen!

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

The division in question is responsible for MS Office which has for years been a cash cow (owing to format lock-in and shortsightedness of governments and businesses). So whether he was the head or not would most likely not have affected the success of that division. His achievements at Macromedia was to sell it to Adobe. Maybe his crowning glory at Nokia would be to sell it to MS ;)

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Wasn't maemo in the same position just before it was ditched and meego announced?

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Several years ago a former CEO of The Stanley Works in the US was fired for running the company into the ground, and received over 50 million dollars severance.

It actually pays better these crazy days to spend a few years screwing a company up and then getting a severance than to run it well.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Well, not quite. It was expected to become Qt based anyway, so not-Meegoish Maemo would have become almost the same minus the RPMs... Doesn't matter what you call it, it just changed names.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Well we need to remember where Nokia is coming from. They where one of the most profitable companies in tech world for long time. They still make money every quarter(especially from their core business, phones).
Nokia is still far away from Moto or SE situation not to even talk about bankprutcy.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Lots of people in North and South America heavily resent the United States' capture of the term "American".

Anyway, let's say your country was about to be taken over by the Treasury Secretary of Nazi Germany. Would you be saying, "oh, we should keep an open mind, just because he's been a Party member for many years, he may be perfectly cool!"

I don't think you would feel that way.

This guy is from Microsoft. He thinks BIG. I doubt that Open Source or our little tablets are going to be of much interest to him. He wants leverage and markets. Our main hope is that the giant doesn't notice these trivial insects scampering around having fun with their little devices.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

wtf. You don't really know how governing works in companies (limited liability ones)

stock owners have full control of company, Eloop is gone in 10 seconds escorted by guard if he goes solo with decisions you described above and "hallitus" (board of directors?) or stockowners disagree..

I bet that the time is reduced to 1,3 seconds if he makes Ollila mad...

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

"he was working at macromedia/adobe -> he will bring-us flash 10.1"

Wondering why nobody has already stated this during this heavy-speculation thread... :)

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

There was a Ollila intreview today in finnish Helsingin Sanomat.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

I just read the same comments, and this is exactly what I expected. Maybe now we can be a bit more calm about what's going to happen?

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Not sure if this as already been posted but just in case its not here the press conference, its stutters little for first couple minutes but after that its perfect.
Stephen ELOP new CEO of Nokia - Press Conference - 10th of Sept 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBjSVvrv1dA

BTW can anyone understand the question the guy asks at 26 minutes? he certainly confuses the Room

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Bernard : I use ovi share ! For me it's much better than flickr and facebook. I have more trust for european compagny than american compagny about my privacy.

Each time I take a photo with my phone, the photo is upload to ovi share to backup it.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Dear Ossi,

I wasn't even addressing corporate governance in my post. I had made it to merely illustrate why the initial suspicions about a top MS executive taking over as Nokia CEO exist in the first place.

Where we come from and what we stand (or have stood) for does, however, say something about us.

That was the point I was making.

Of course I wasn't exactly pleased with your "linux idiots" or "wish tru3 un1x p3ople would have grown up" generalizations.

You see a few conspirary theorists and a few who slam the new guy from the get go. Just let these folks vent if that's what they want.

But you're not exactly unlike them by jumping into conclusions and making hostile generalizations. So really, just chill already. :p

Again, I merely made a few points why initial suspicions exist but I also ended my comment by saying that I'm giving him a chance to prove himself.

So, shoot me for not throwing myself at Mr Elop's feet already! :D


PS. I don't mind actually discussing corporate governance issues with you elsewhere if that's what you want, but wrt. Mr Elop it's still too early for me to draw any clear conclusions about his actual ambitions (for Nokia) or his management style.

Like most Nokia watchers, I'm welcoming changes at the top, but my expectations are tempered by Elop's past involvement in highly proprietary sections of the tech industry.

I suppose we'll find out soon enough.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

That would be brilliant sequal to his "If you live in Finland, you’ll stab yourself in the head" clip from from last month.

Stephen Colbert breaks down the world’s greatest country…Finland!

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

and what does Elop's career tell about him? If his job has previously been listening the board of directors and make things happend, does it make him evil propietary only -guy? Not everyone gets to choose the perfect working place for himself, especially one that projects all the personal values of employer...

and I stop using words like "linux idiot" etc as soon as people stop acting like ones here....

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Hah... that's funny! I hadn't seen (or maybe I just don't remember seeing) that clip before. :) The guy's a genius.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Maybe Elop will be good for Nokia, maybe not. He sounds like most generic executives - reasonably intelligent and very good at talking and answering questions while saying nothing and not giving answers.

But I'm not concerned with Nokia or how much money they make. I didn't buy a N900 because it was a Nokia. I bought it because it was the only thing that put an open Linux distro in my pocket on hardware that suited my needs (T-Mobile 3G, resistive screen, etc). Everything considered, it looks like I may be keeping the N900 for a long time.

IOW, I'm concerned only with MeeGo, because if at all possible my next phone will be running MeeGo. And I just can't see this guy Elop being a positive thing for MeeGo. MeeGo is all about being open. Everything Elop has ever done screams proprietary. Betcha if you asked him a month ago what he thinks of MeeGo he would've said it depends on where you're going.

At this point Nokia has no deep commitment to MeeGo they can't easily walk away from. Nothing MeeGo presently on the market. Only the pie-in-the-sky promise of something actually running Maemo 6/Harmattan but called MeeGo. As for Nokia's Qt strategy, well, it is cross-platform...so...can you say Qt and WinPhone 7 in the same sentence? Yes, yes you can.

Consider that Microsoft is nothing if not:
a. Loaded with cash.
b. Relentless and willing to spend to gain a goal.
c. Ruthless to the point of at least borderline evil.

Considering the above and that they now have one of their own at the top of power at Nokia, what do you think M$ would be willing to do to get WinPhone 7 as the OS on a worldwide market as huge as Nokia's? To deliver Windows gaming, Exchange, Office, Bing, cloud services, etc. etc. to that market?

And what is Nokia willing to do to make a major dent in the North American Market? Well, we know now at minimum giving the CEO job to a M$ lackey. Does it include WinPhone 7? Betcha it does...

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

I'm worried too, but Nokia didn't need to get an MS exec to switch to Windows, they'd just do it if they wanted to and save the expense of changing CEO's. I'd hope Elop gets behind the Meego strategy and gives 100% to make it work. The benefit to Nokia is control over the OS, the look and feel and a chance to dominant, versus looking the same as other manufacturers devices using W7 or Andriod. If it doesn't work out in a year or two then things may change, but that was always a possibility. Meego has a chance to be big, it just needs to get out there and start selling.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

There is now way in hell Nokia would cancel/ stop/ pause the Meego push. Right now that project is at critical mass ... it is moving at its own volition. Nokia needs a hardware out for Christmas, or early next year and the N8's demand should bee waning at this stage requiring pricing incentives to keep things up. They can't afford a product drought between January and May ... if he was to scrap plans beginning on his first day ... it will take a year plus to make the product through conception to implementation especially at a big company like Nokia which has phased releases, the N8 is not that ahead of the curve to warrant consistent demand a year after release.

It is done deal, Meego is safe ... if they ousted OPK 6 months ago it would have been a different story and more uncertainty would have arisen.

What Mr. Elop has to do is control the brand ... Nokia has lost credibility, and brand integrity in the North American segment. Outlets like Eldar, Engadget, Gizmodo control the Nokia narrative in the North American market begin to change that by being more transparent share news on products early like updates and new services (no news conference hullabaloo ... just tweet it and let the Engadget's find it), find the product leaker(s), and send out completed prototypes to reviewers even if it is a shitty phone ... will teach Nokia not to release something they cannot stand behind. Integrate some Ovi services into the Android market and the Iphone market. This will enhance Ovi's presence and create transitory bridges to the Nokia world from other phones. The NFC thing I've been hearing would create Nokia money if it was sold on Apples app market, it wouldn't be much money but having Ovi plastered on it creates the awareness needed. Nokia needs to improve customer support, it needs to make it a walk in type affair, no mailing out no middle man CSR's, just walk in give it in and pick it up when it is fixed also people who will quickly check for common issues ... Nokia phone support is seriously lacking and requires drastic changes. They need to reengage disenfranchised customers to see what phones are wanted, and to keep us in the loop not on operations but more specific tangibles as to what is happening with the current phone. Mr Elop can help by changing the N900 Meego policy ... a lot of goodwill will come from that.

He needs to stick to the plan for the most part. Release a meego phone and than reshape the services around the phones.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Funny.. Nokia isnt doing too well lately - so they replace one incompetent idiot with another from a competing company who apparently is also failing in the mobile space!

Excellent.. very good logic, Nokia..

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Some years ago I read that the "mobile" division of MS had spent $10 billion and had hardly made a dent in their market share (that was back in the PDA days when Palm was the overwhelming market leader). God knows how many more billions they have spent since and still with nothing much to show for it. Assume in a collective act of madness Nokia replaced all their phones to use WP7, does that mean WP7 will then have a huge market share? Hardly likely, Nokia will be plagued by complaints - phones crashing all the time, piss poor battery life, poor performance etc. It will simply drive more iphone and android sales.

When WP7's predecessor has been losing more and more market share and given MS's dismal track record why do you think using WP7 will give Nokia a bigger share of the NA market?

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Oops. They mistakenly invited Nokia's CEO! Good thing they fixed that before it was too late. ;)

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

There aren't exactly a flood of exec candidates running successful business in mobile space. Who would you have hired?

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

They walked away from Maemo soon after putting the N900 on the market. They have nothing MeeGo for sale so at this point are less committed to MeeGo than Maemo. They can drop MeeGo now and 99% of the public would never know anything had happened.

N8.

N8 will still be relatively fresh on the market early 2011. N9 could come out early 2011 to keep something new out there.

WinPhone 7 is about ready now. It could easily be on a Nokia phone in your local store in 6 months.

It's mostly behind the curve already. Underpowered CPU, Symbian OS, etc. And overpriced. No way it will stand up against the competition for a year anyway. I don't think it was ever intended to be anything more than a stopgap, new product to tide Nokia over 'til a top-notch MeeGo - or WinPhone 7 - unit is ready.

Well, it's safe in that it's an open OS that can be maintained independently by the community, much like any other Linux distro. But without the massive market power of Nokia it's success commercially is very much in question.

Agreed. But again, I'm really not concerned with Nokia's success, only MeeGo's.

That's not happening, especially if Nokia goes WinPhone 7. The whole push with WinPhone 7 is to be , if anything, even more proprietary locked-in than Apple. What I can see happening is Ovi (which has been a miserable, mismanaged mess) disappearing in favor of some kind of M$/Nokia services collaboration.

He should - would - if the world worked right. I'm certainly hoping I'm wrong, that he's smarter than he appears and he gets 110% behind MeeGo/Qt. The MeeGo/Qt strategy is solid. It will result in products superior to WinPhone 7 and will work given time. And supporting OSS is, in a kinda moralistic way, the Right Thing to Do.

But everything now seems to me to indicate that is not Elop or Nokia's plan. WinPhone 7 would grab NA marketshare and public awareness, and so will satisfy stockholders quicker. In the real world quick $$ usually wins out over Doing the Right Thing.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

They don't care. Chump change to them. M$ will gladly spend a LOT more to win the mobile market. They know that the very future of M$, say 20-30 years from now, will likely be determined by how they do in the mobile market in the next 5-10 years. They'll spend any amount, whatever it takes. And M$ is a bulldog with a collar stuffed with cash.

Not immediately. But they have Symbian to tide them over, same as they would if they followed through with MeeGo.

A poor OS didn't keep DOS/Win95-98/NT/XP/Win7 from dominating the world. The original iPhone was trash. The original G1/Android 1.0 was a cripple. Both sold like crazy anyway. People are stupid and will put up with a lot of crap.

It's M$ Windows. Name recognition. Blind, stupid acceptance in NA of anything M$. And Nokia's NA marketshare is so small it can only go up.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

They may have to give the phones away and pay people cash each time they make a call to encourage people to use them.

People like winmobile less than they like Symbian.

There are various reasons for the widespread use of dos/win. Some keywords: standardisation, compatibility, ruthless stamping out of competition using illegal means, bribing/blackmailing of manufacturers, abusing monopoly, etc.

Exactly - avoid like the plague.
Only corporates with legacy baggage infrastructure will be buying WP7 phonesin any substantial quantities. You really think consumers will rush to buy WP7 phones when one of its boasted features is being "an ad serving machine"?

In the long term the importance of the NA market (for any good/services) will continue to shrink. Since Nokia has historically not done well in NA anyway, the "loss" of it is no great deal.

Re: Nokia CEO Resigns
 

Possibly, but integrating it with Ovi software and services would not be completed in that time. WinPhone 7 lacks the Qt, which is chosen by Nokia long time ago to be the development environment for their devices and bringing such support for WinPhone won't happen in 6 months, if ever. Microsoft has it's own development tools (usually they have quite good tools) and it's not in their interest to switch over to Qt. I really don't see any good reason why Nokia would change OS at this point. Not in short term and especially not in the long term. Hiring CEO from Microsoft is not reason for such change.