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NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

Here's the article.

Registration is required to get the article. I've never received spam as a result of registering about twenty years ago.

Notably, the article doesn't mention the N900, but it does mention the "Booklet".

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

Quote:

The migration of wireless technology to higher-speed networks like LTE that are based on the GSM standard used by Nokia should also help the Finnish company sell phones

I think this will help them gain market share. As everyone adopts LTE and there's a single standard, it starts to get easier to switch networks. At some point people will realize they can take their phone with them.

And don't forget that it wasn't too long ago when everyone had a 5120 or 8210.

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

There are so many factual and judgmental errors in that article that it looks like page filler.

Quote:

But in the United States, despite two decades of trying, Nokia is struggling. The company, based in Finland, has seen its market share slip to 7 percent in June, down from 10 percent a year earlier and from a market-best 35 percent in March 2002.

Error: cognitive dissonance.

Quote:

Three years after Apple introduced the iPhone, Nokia has no touch-screen sales hit or phenomenon to compete with it as American consumers shop for Christmas.

Intellectual honesty would compel the writer to at least mention the N900 in passing.

Quote:

Nokia is trying to recover from a decade-long set of mistakes that is forcing the company to play catch-up with Samsung, LG, Motorola, Research in Motion and Apple.

Motorola? They don't belong in that list.

Quote:

Among its biggest blunders in terms of U.S. sales, according to analysts and former Nokia executives, the company failed to design nearly all of its phones to meet the taste of American consumers.

Disingenuous slant. Yes, they were slow to flip phones, but what terrible journalism.

Quote:

It also designed its models to work on a European communications standard called GSM when about half the U.S. market — including the customers of Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel — uses CDMA.

Yes.. and half the US market is GSM!

Quote:

An executive at a North American network operator, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said, “The attitude at Nokia was basically: ‘Here is a phone, do you want it?’ Nokia wouldn’t play by the rules here, and they have paid a price.”

Nokai made an executive decision at one point to try to break the carrier stranglehold by moving some business direct to retail with richly-featured UNLOCKED phones. Other manufacturers capitalized on this by cozying up to carriers.. The quoted former Nokia execs know this-- maybe responses were edited?

Quote:

“They claim they get it and understand the U.S. market,” said Ramon Llamas, a senior analyst at IDC in Framingham, Massachusetts. “It’s the story we have heard for the past couple of years. But the execution still is not there.”

I easily agree with that last statement. Captain Obvious speaks! :D

Quote:

Besides initially failing to adapt its handsets for U.S. networks, Nokia did not anticipate changes in American consumer tastes, like the development of preferences for flip phones and touch screens, said Neil Mawston, an analyst in London with Strategy Analytics.

More failed research from the author. 7710, anyone? True, failure to capitalize-- but that is not the same as failure to anticipate.

Overall, horrible, horrible analysis. I'd fire the author.

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

Don't really feel like registering/remembering my registering, but I'll take from Texrat's quotes a few notes...

...many US journalists are still trying to wrap their heads around mobile
... GSM is 4/5th of the world's usage of cellular
...Nokia did and continues to want to do things diffeferently. Its not always worked for them as they intended, but they do have a sizable piece of the mobile market (35-40% is more than double of #2's share)
...Moto holds a compelling view in the minds of many because of the Razr. Despite the fact that it was old when it released, and the 20 versions of it that came after, as a branding strategy, its done only what the iPhone has been able to do since. If they approached Nokia from that end, maybe the article would have fit.
...did the article say anything about how low-end Nokia's are doing well in the US for the nacient pre-paid market. Other than that approach, blips like N and ESeries and the N900 are just that, for now.

Ah well, could have been some solid Sunday reading if they knew a bit more.

EDIT: Clicked on the article link and read the whole thing, nope, not impressed. Seems way to apologetic to me, and definitely not exactly speaking good or bad of Nokia. More like filler than anything else. Wonder if it was neutered before going to press.

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

I'm wondering why this is in Off Topic. Should be in General.

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

heh, i keep seeing US journalists praise the US made CDMA mobile system any chance they get...

btw, have anyone else noticed that the real mobile action is in africa, south asia and eastern europe? all areas where there is no big legacy installations of wired networks, be their phone or otherwise?

hell, didnt nokia launch a payment system for their S40 phones specifically aimed at african nations?

i do wonder if N900-like products, ones they get over the early adopter pricing, will sell big in those areas of the world...

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

Quote:

Originally Posted by tso (Post 350498)

Ding! There are many journalists and enterprises here in the US that don't get it. I live in the SouthEast US, this is litereally the last area in the country that gets it about any tech. So imagine my fun at talking mobile anything. Things here have so much legacy behind them that people cannont just move on. Whereas in other places, they see our lessons and start from where we are most advanced, with the lessons learned. Aka, no legacy, aka better usage models.

Oh well. Maybe I'll find a gig with a mobile consultanting company and move to greener pastures... or just create something new here that people get that's not kool-aid ;)

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

heh, i think my biggest surprise was when i read that some US people still use checkbooks when paying bills and similar.

and this is the nation thats supposedly the leading light of the world?

Re: NY Times Article on Nokia US Blunders

I'm no spoke person for Nokia, but the way they operate seems as if they don't even want to compete in the US markets.

Look at the condition of North American cellular companies.

I think if people were smart enough to do some 1st grade math they would actually realize how much cheaper buying an unlocked phone is (that is of course, if there are no special deals going on at that time), and I think that is the way Nokia wants to do it, if they are going to.

edit:

Quote:

“Nokia, at the height of its success, decided not to adapt its phones for the U.S. market; that was a mistake,” said Ari Hakkarainen, a Nokia business development executive from 1999 through 2007. “They are still trying to recover from this.”

When was this quote taken? I mean, did Ari say this back in 2007? or is he saying it now after he is no more the development executive of Nokia? and wonder if this person still works for/in Nokia?