Nokia's Present & Future

[Helmore]

Where does he say that? Or did you talk to him?

 

[Jubei]

Where does he say that? Or did you talk to him?

On his twitter. There was a discussion about WP specs, another guy was trying to say the next version will still be last gen and use S600, Brian said no trust me it will be S800

 

[Mize]

yeah I dont buy it either
I can see going from 1->2 being a major headache.

Also
When more cores than 4 phones are released in the future (hint to MS -> this will happen) I betcha android will support them within the week. Its like ppl are implying
MS -> wow thats a shock, 6 cores who'ld of thought, well we need to rewrite the OS just give us a year we havent planned for this

MS are not that incompetent

While MS specifically ONLY supports snapdragon, Exynos octo-cores are already available on the Galaxy S4.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

No they aren't. They only hit 1M sales in three months, and that's with a huge existing BB userbase to tap into.

As a freshly new OS, its sales are head and shoulders above the windows phone when it came out.
WP is not a new player, it's been around for two and a half years and it didn't get any meaningful traction so far.

Your charts hardly convinced me otherwise. LG doesn't even have twice WP8's sales, and they're the second largest Android maker. As I said, everyone but Samsung is fighting for scraps. WP8 is growing and pretty much all Nokia's.

So getting a bit over half of LG's sales is now considered a "win" for Nokia??

For fu"#$s sake, LG's mobile division delivered an operational profit in Q1 2013.
LG made 133 million while Nokia lost 150 million in the same period.

Do you even understand the idiocy of trying to make Nokia look good in front of LG's 1Q2013 results?!

Huawei and ZTE also did a profit, which is steadily growing YoY. And LG, Huawei or ZTE don't even have a fraction of Nokia's (prior to 2011 and their trojan horse CEO) expertize and intellectual property on mobile phones.

My point competely flew over your head. WP8 is almost all Nokia. They're dominating other WP8 handsets, and don't care about lack of OS differentiation from them. What they need to differentiate from is Android and iOS, and it's working.

Your point is completely irrelevant because Nokia is "king" of 2.9% of the whole smartphone market.
Owning the whole WP8 market is worth shit for Nokia because owning the whole WP8 market is not enough to maintain the company!

How is this not obvious?
Just what kind of reality distortion field is Mr. Elop emanating?

the best thing about going with wp for nokia was the billions they get from MS for doing so.

Except they didn't get billions from Microsoft. All they got was a partnership on the marketing budget from Microsoft, but Nokia still has to pay Microsoft for each WP device they sell.
Nokia has to pay Microsoft for an O.S. and at the same time it has to wait for Microsoft to update said O.S. to support new features and SoCs - how and when Microsoft feels to do so.

It's pretty obvious who drew the short stick here.

MS are not that incompetent

I know some people who work at Microsoft.
It's obviously wrong to say that an entire company is made of incompetent people. Within its ~100 000 employees, I'm positive there are several thousands of good-natured, hard-working, intelligent and efficient people.

But oh boy, you'd be surprised at how stupid and incompetent are some of the people who get to become higher-ups only to destroy several man-labor years out of sheer ignorance, pride or stubbornness.

Of course Nokia's board of directors surpasses every single company in the incompetence department.
Or maybe they're all just corrupt and all of them got a chunk load of money for devaluing Nokia in order to be sold by peanuts. If that's the case, they're doing a great job.

Windows Phone 8 supports a maximum of 64 cores. I believe the problem is driver related, not that the OS doesn't support the hardware.

That's weird. Doesn't the Adreno 320 work with legacy drivers from Adreno 305 with minor adjustments, even if the DirectX compliance is scaled back?
Adreno 305 is already supported as it's already present in HTC and Huawei models.

On his twitter. There was a discussion about WP specs, another guy was trying to say the next version will still be last gen and use S600, Brian said no trust me it will be S800

And when is this "next batch" of WP8 devices coming?
If it's Q4 2013 announcement with Q1/Q2 2014 global availability, this next batch if WP8 models will be using last-year hardware all over again.

 

[Helmore]

IDC seems to have slightly different figures than Gartner. Just check here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/ho...-iOS-Combine-92.3-Smartphone-Operating-System

Windows Phone shipped 7.0 million units in Q1, which is a market share of 3.2%, that's up from 3.0 million units in Q1 2012 and 2.0% market share. A growth of 133.3% in unit shipments.
BlackBerry OS shipped 6.3 million units in Q1, which is a market share of 2.9%, that down from 9.7 million units in Q1 2012 and 6.4% market share. A 'growth' of -35.1% in unit shipments.

It's truly a case where Windows Phone and Blackberry are fighting for scraps. Android has 75.0% market share and iOS has 17.3%, which means that all the other platforms are fighting for the remaining 7.7% of the market.

This is what IDC had to say about BlackBerry and Windows Phone:

"Underpinning the worldwide smartphone market is the constantly shifting operating system landscape," noted Ramon Llamas, research manager with IDC's Mobile Phone team. "Android and iOS accounted for more than the lion's share of smartphones in the first quarter, but a closer examination of the other platforms reveals turnaround and demand for alternatives. Windows Phone has benefited from Nokia's participation, and BlackBerry's new BB10 devices have already hit a million units shipped in its first quarter of availability."

"Windows Phone claiming the third spot is a first and helps validate the direction taken by Microsoft and key partner Nokia," said Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker. "Given the relatively low volume generated, the Windows Phone camp will need to show further gains to solidify its status as an alterative to Android or iOS."

This is also the first time I've seen any definitive number on the amount of BB10 devices shipped.

 

[eastmen]

WP will hit 5% of the market this year . Still to little but its still growing.

mean while in android land

http://www.engadget.com/2013/05/16/samsung-estimated-to-make-95-percent-of-android-device-profits/

 

[Deleted member 13524]

WP will hit 5% of the market this year . Still to little but its still growing.

You're not counting with Jolla which may become a geek favorite or BB10 (both are able to run Android apps, BTW).
As I showed in the last page, Gartner gives BB the upper hand and puts WP below 3%.


And even if Nokia gets 100% of the WP8 market, 5% is still just some 10 million phones.
I think Nokia in its current state can hardly survive on 10 million phones, unless all of them have iphone-like profits per-unit (newsflash: they don't)

Besides, Google at yesterday's I/O seemed pretty focused on keeping the duopoly with apple: they just announced a mountain of apps and services that they'll share with iOS - and obviously won't share with WP.

 

[eastmen]

we will see. In a few years it will go android wp then ios

 

[Mize]

Bad move on MS' part to launch a YouTube app that shafted Google on their ad revenue...
I'm definitely anxiously awaiting the first Jolla phone and to give the BB Q10 hardware keyboard a try. As good as some virtual keyboards can be (Swype, SwiftKey, BB Z10) the fact is that I'm a scientist and engineer and am constantly using words that get autocorrected to idiocy. At least BB OS10 does what webOS did which is undo any autocorrect with a simple backspace (unlike all the others where you have to delete the whole word and start over).

 

[Mize]

we will see. In a few years it will go android wp then ios

That would suck.
The only HMI worse than iOS is Metro and the only OS more locked down than iOS is WP.

Then again you were likely a rabid win 3.1 fan pushing it and W95 to glory when real innovative OSes like NeXTStep and AmigaOS were setting the standards that allowed win7 to come along only 16 years later. Nothing like holding back innovation!

 

[eastmen]

That would suck.
The only HMI worse than iOS is Metro and the only OS more locked down than iOS is WP.

Then again you were likely a rabid win 3.1 fan pushing it and W95 to glory when real innovative OSes like NeXTStep and AmigaOS were setting the standards that allowed win7 to come along only 16 years later. Nothing like holding back innovation!

Sure sure. At the end of the day its most important that a phone works than a computer. Andriod is a huge mess and the phones are low quality. I want a phone that just works and if that means giving up custom roms then so be it.

 

[Jubei]

And even if Nokia gets 100% of the WP8 market, 5% is still just some 10 million phones.
I think Nokia in its current state can hardly survive on 10 million phones, unless all of them have iphone-like profits per-unit (newsflash: they don't)

Considering the recent news that there has been a sharp decline in apps being published for WP (only 140k thus far) i suspect the majority of Nokias sales are in the low end segment rather than Lumia 920 type flagships. If true the margins are fairly low and the growth is far too slow to sustain Nokia in the long term

 

[Mize]

Sure sure. At the end of the day its most important that a phone works than a computer. Andriod is a huge mess and the phones are low quality. I want a phone that just works and if that means giving up custom roms then so be it.

First off, CM10.1 is not a mess and it at least as reliable as any stock ROM without bloat or stutter. You should give it a try.

Secondly, you give up far more than that. You don't even have support for IMAP IDLE (push) on WP8 - something that was available on the very first, pre-Treo PalmOS phones. Hell, you only have ONE choice for an email app. You give up user-replaceable batteries, SD cards for expanded storage, file system access for manipulating files:

- don't have a .rar, .gzip, etc. app on Android, webOS, BB10 or MeeGo? Just open a terminal and open it that way.
- want to make a backup copy of a file, store it in a locked directory and then work on the copy? No problem on those other OSes.
- want to connect your phone to your laptop on a plane and pull email attachments that you received on your phone onto your laptop? Not on WP8.
- want to transfer that PPT that you spent the entire flight to Germany preparing to your mobile before you land so you can send it as soon as you can power up that phone? Not on WP8.

Competition and innovation are good. Innovation is best when the innovators succeed. Apply may or may not be dying, but the paradigm of the iPhone changed everything. There would be no WP8 as it is today without the iPhone. webOS was better and lost the fight and many of its innovations are lost (at least for now).

What is the innovation of WP8? Tiles? Sorry, that was already patented. Nice animations? Seriously.

 

[Mize]

Wow, WP8 *still* doesn't have Strava, MapMyRide or RideWithGPS...and I just read the Tom's guide to the 20 best apps and it includes a stopwatch, a battery level indicator app, shortcut app for settings, ringtones and an app that fixes a storage issue to free up space on the flash.

Considering the vast majority of Tom's 20 best apps for WP8 have MeeGo equivalent or alternatives (not to mention MeeGo, the dead OS, having plenty of apps WP8 doesn't have) I don't see how anyone can be so enthusiastic about WP8's prospects. Then again, reality TV is the biggest winner in media so I clearly don't understand why people buy what they buy.

 

[Helmore]

Considering the recent news that there has been a sharp decline in apps being published for WP (only 140k thus far) i suspect the majority of Nokias sales are in the low end segment rather than Lumia 920 type flagships. If true the margins are fairly low and the growth is far too slow to sustain Nokia in the long term

Nokia just said that most of their smartphone revenue is from the Lumia 920.

 

[Jubei]

Nokia just said that most of their smartphone revenue is from the Lumia 920.

link?

 

[wco81]

But the ASP of the 920 is probably less than iPhone and high-end Android phones?

Because they were practically giving them away with BOGO and other promotions.

 

[Deleted member 13524]

Nokia just said that most of their smartphone revenue is from the Lumia 920.

They also said the Lumia 900 was being an astounding success and the Lumia 920 was sold off everywhere.
Not to mention the DSLR commercial fiasco and other stuff.

Having the highest retail price, I do believe that the Nokia 920 is the model that provides more revenue to Nokia.
But I don't believe even for a second that the sales revenues of the Nokia 920 amount to more than all the WP7 Lumias, 810, 820, 720, 620, 520 and all the Ashas combined.
And neither should you, to be honest.

(Nokia now considers the Asha line as smartphones, BTW)

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Windows Phone 8 is not the third ecossystem. BB10 gave WP8 a headstart of over 3 months and it's already getting more sales and more attention.
Even if Nokia gets 100% of WP8 marketshare, it will not be enough to maintain its 80 000 employees, even after closing all its factories and most of its R&D centers.

Windows Phone is a dead end. Each day Nokia is exclusively dedicated to it is another step into bankruptcy, tens of thousands of jobs lost and a severe stab on Finnish/European patrimony.
I'm still dazzled to see how some people are convinced of something else.

According to your own link, Blackberry is still sinking quite fast. Marketshare has dropped from 6.8% to 3.0%. Meanwhile WP market is still rising. Up to 2.9% from 1.9%.

IDC doesn't paint a rosy picture for them either. Marketshare for BB dropped from 6.4% to 2.9% While WP rose from 2.0% to 3.2%

Oh and unless you want to cherry pick numbers. That doesn't mean BB is necessarily ahead of WP. Ahead by 0.1% in Gartner and behind by 0.3% in IDC.

What both agree on however is that market share continues to plummet for the BB OS while it continues to rise for the WP OS. And with no long term data available for BB10, there's no way to predict how it will turn out.

So getting a bit over half of LG's sales is now considered a "win" for Nokia??

For fu"#$s sake, LG's mobile division delivered an operational profit in Q1 2013.
LG made 133 million while Nokia lost 150 million in the same period.

Do you even understand the idiocy of trying to make Nokia look good in front of LG's 1Q2013 results?!

Considering LG's lineup is mature (how long have they been selling Android phones?) and top to bottom (low end to high end), the comparison is actually pretty good. Using your Garner link LG sold ~10 million units compared to ~5 million Lumia units. Also considering that is without a full quarter of sales from the Lumia 620 which could make a significant impact and before the Lumia 520 was even available for sale. Yes, that's quite respectable.

Considering all of the Android players that are above them feature a full lineup including cheap budget Android phones, Nokia will finally start to compete on a relatively equal footing with the 620 (~250 USD) and 520 (under 200 USD) in the lineup.

With the 620 and even cheaper 520, the brand should do a lot better. Of course, as a company that's going to be offset by diminished sales in their other smartphones until those are a non-factor. Considering that combined their total Smartphone shipments (including WP8) only came to 6.1 million. So even with the rest of the non-Lumia branded smartphones dying off, they stand ship significantly more than that for 1Q 2014.

I'm not going to predict where their sales are a year from now, but it wouldn't surprise me if they had faster growth than ZTE, Huawei and/or LG, and were able to at least hit 5th place.

As to losses, that isn't unexpected considering they are having to sell stock of older phones (like virtually unsellable Symbian devices) at significant discounts. Likely under cost and thus taking a loss on each sale.

Regards,
SB

 

[Mintmaster]

As a freshly new OS, its sales are head and shoulders above the windows phone when it came out.

They had a huge existing userbase out there waiting for an upgrade. Few people still had Windows Mobile.

BB10 has no chance of developing an ecosystem. WP wouldn't either, but it has MS's funding along with the Win8/RT trojan to entice people to create WP8 versions with minimal code changes.

So getting a bit over half of LG's sales is now considered a "win" for Nokia??

When did I say that? It shows how useless it would have been for Nokia to go Android in 2011.

For fu"#$s sake, LG's mobile division delivered an operational profit in Q1 2013.
LG made 133 million while Nokia lost 150 million in the same period.

Right, because Q1 2013 is a great predictor of every quarter in the future.

Hell, even looking back one quarter shreds your 'evidence' to pieces: in Q4 2012, LG's mobile division lost $4M, while Nokia made $585M. Add up Q4 2012 and Q1 2013, and Nokia has triple the profits.

LG's mobile division has far less upside than Nokia, despite being in a more advantageous manufacturing environment.

Huawei and ZTE also did a profit, which is steadily growing YoY.

Huawei and ZTE have costs that Nokia can only dream of achieving. They are exactly the type of margin-erasing competition that create a market where Samsung gets 95% of the total profits from Android phone sales and everyone else is scratching and clawing for the remaining 5%.

Your point is completely irrelevant because Nokia is "king" of 2.9% of the whole smartphone market.

No it's not, because it's growing.

Except they didn't get billions from Microsoft. All they got was a partnership on the marketing budget from Microsoft, but Nokia still has to pay Microsoft for each WP device they sell.

Microsoft gives Nokia $250M per quarter, and despite royalties, it has been the net payer to Nokia thus far and will continue to do so this year. Only with the long term success of WP will they give net payments to MS.
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/924613/000119312513095072/d484054d20f.htm#tx484054_5a

Spoiler

Our agreement with Microsoft includes platform support payments from Microsoft to us as well as software royalty payments from us to Microsoft. Under the terms of the agreement governing the platform support payments, the amount of each quarterly platform support payment is USD 250 million.

We have a competitive software royalty structure, which includes annual minimum software royalty commitments that vary over the life of the agreement. Software royalty payments, with minimum commitments are paid quarterly. Over the life of the agreement, both the platform support payments and the minimum software royalty commitments are expected to measure in the billions of US dollars. Over the life of the agreement the total amount of the platform support payments is expected to slightly exceed the total amount of the minimum software royalty commitment payments.

As of the end of 2012, the amount of platform support payments received by Nokia has exceeded the amount of minimum software royalty commitment payments made to Microsoft, thus the net cash flows have been in our favor. As a result, the remaining minimum software royalty commitment payments are expected to exceed the remaining platform support payments by a total of approximately EUR 0.5 billion over the remaining life of the agreement.

However, in 2013 the amount of the platform support payments is expected to slightly exceed the total amount of the minimum software royalty commitment payments, thus the net cash flows are still expected to be slightly in our favor.