Losses mark Nokia’s tenth year in the industry
When the Finnish company finally admitted losing its decade-held lead in the mobile phone industry, the public might have pointed a finger at the economic recession. But truth is, Nokia have had the fiercest competition and seemed to have played the game wrong. Nokia’s 41% share of the converged mobile device market was reported to have dived down to just 35% after just four months.
For starters, the introduction of smartphones from Apple, Samsung, LG and HTC bit a large portion of Nokia’s over 40% following. Plus, consumers now prefer the most available touchscreen gadgets from other manufacturers like Blackberry and Motorola, among others. Even with the later release of the Nokia N97 smartphone, the Finnish company was already sliding in the market.
With consumers careful about switching to more expensive deals due to the economic slump, Nokia was playing it safe, shipping some 108.5 million units in the third quarter this year, some 5% up from the previous quarter, but noted 8% down for the same period in 2008.
Ollie-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia chief executive, spoke of the industry’s performance as a whole which resulted to the reported loss. He said that their company would have marked more sales in devices and smartphones but the constraints of the industry hit them as well. The selling price for the second quarter in 2009 was only €62, down by €10 for the same period last year.
The industry analysts, however, don’t see it that way. Instead, they point Nokia’s loss with the fact the Finnish company hasn’t come out with an iPhone competitor and its release of N97 seemed too overrated. As of September this year, there was no noted increase in the sales of Nokia’s recently unveiled smartphone device. Even with Nokia’s pronouncements of releasing four new touchscreen phones, the analysts insisted it will merely increase volume but not value.
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