Comments on: Transitions: The Nokia Way vs. The Microsoft Way

By: Will the Double Osborne Effect Kill Nokia? : Nokia Innovation

Will the Double Osborne Effect Kill Nokia? : Nokia Innovation — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 06:34:12 +0000

[...] rant was inspired by: Transitions: The Nokia Way vs. The Microsoft Way thanks for the inspiration Monday [...]

By: Bandscheibe

Bandscheibe — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 12:51:03 +0000

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By: Nintendo Just Osborned Itself | ConceivablyTech

Nintendo Just Osborned Itself | ConceivablyTech — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 20:15:14 +0000

[...] consequences of an announcement, which former Apple executive and Be founder Jean-Louis Gassee thinks has sent Nokia into a downward spiral. The same may be true for [...]

By: KN

KN — Sat, 11 Jun 2011 04:20:49 +0000

I think that the results now are a failure of the previous management – to get Symbian or Meego remotely competitive in a timely fashion.
In a company like Nokia I don’t see how Elop could develop WP7 handsets in secret and suddenly spring them upon the public and the rest of the company.
The consensus based politics of Nokia (and I guess Finland) would not make that possible.
Witness what happened in Tampere and with the CTO when they took this softly approach. I would imagine strikes and attempts and boardroom coups would be in the works if Elop had tried the other approach

By: Tom B

Tom B — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 01:46:40 +0000

Rule of thumb: get too chummy with MSFT and die. Look what Belluzo did to Silicon Graphics. When NOK hired a MSFT reject, it was obvious to the rest of the world that NOK was way further along the path to extinction than the polar bear.

By: MH

MH — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 16:10:05 +0000

@ Peter (and all the people who think M$ is a player in this game)

M$’s “Windows Everywhere” stategery (yes, I mean that spelling) has been trumpeted for more than 10 years, and it has been stillborn for all that time.

I remember they were going to put it in refrigerators, copiers, microwaves and others. They have had tablet concepts in the market for 10 years. The demand for backward compatibility and all the attendant baggage have created failure after failure for M$. This new W8 on Arm and Tablets in 18 months is just the latest vapor announcement from them.

In the 80s and 90s they could launch vaporous products and freeze their competitors in the minds of their prospective clients but their ability to do this now is very limited. Google and Apple both have a much higher/better reputation at actual product delivery. Apple in particular seems to be the innovation engine that M$ is no longer able to be a fast follower to.

Since I no longer think M$ is relevant in discussions of future technology directions, I personally don’t care if M$ makes it or not. But, if Nokia can right itself while attached to M$’s coattails, more power to them. Relevance or lack thereof leads to desperation on M$’s part as Jean-Louis says:

“So what really happened?
I think the explanation is simple: Microsoft demanded an immediate announcement. They needed a PR coup. With no Phone 7 OS sales to speak of, Microsoft had no revenue to lose and the perception of adoption by the biggest cell phone maker to gain. (After the NokiaSoft announcement, Microsoft got an instant boost of phone credibility.)”

Microsoft’s desperation is palpable. Steve Balmer (in his cult of personality/company) is trying to prevent M$ from becoming IBM, where they can hang on to legacy businesses and profit but no longer steer the industry. I reckon time will tell.

By: EJ

EJ — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 14:37:39 +0000

RIM’s dismal 2011 performance proves that this argument is weak at best. RIM were arguably technologically “ahead” of Nokia with a more respected developer ecosystem, sexier current gen devices, the viral BBM, and, yes, a smooth transition road map to their next generation of software. But their stock and sales performance have been similarly catastrophic – they’re hemorrhaging marketshare and giving similarly dire guidance warnings.

We’ve hit an inflection point in the phone market where Symbian and Blackberry phones are seen as outdated and where new smartphone buyers (the vast majority of the market) want to buy an Android or iPhone before they walk into the store. I mean, would you really recommend a Symbian phone to anybody in 2011? Even a roughly equivalent phone like Windows Phone 7 faces an uphill battle.

By: Peter

Peter — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 13:51:00 +0000

. Remember “One device to rule them all”? The Android tablets powered by a docking phone are a great step – a Windows 8 phone/tablet combo with backwards compatibility would be unbeatable.

By: Allan With Sørensen

Allan With Sørensen — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 11:27:59 +0000

I was excited when the rumors about a Microsoft / Nokia partnership began to stir, that excitement turned to worry when the “Burning platform” memo was leaked, and that worry turned to, well, unbelief, when they announced the death of Symbian.

I would have expected a much softer launch of WP on Nokia devices. Announcing the death of your flagship product which still holds substantial market share with no real substitute in place for almost a full year seems… welll… premature…

As you said, Jean-Louis, Nokia could have waited and then launched WP devices alongside their Symbian brethren with full marketing trumpets blazing the merits and advantages of both. Nokia has always been about different kinds of devices and OS’es for different markets, so why not? And should Symbian eventually fail, well then one could at least hope that WP would have succeeded in the mean time. Just look at how S80 was pushed aside by S60. And btw. it could have been advantageous for Microsoft as well to have the rumor mill churning for half a year about a possible Nokia WP device coming out. Stir up some excitement and brain share in the tech press…

I’m personally looking very much forward to WP on Nokia devices, they could still come out with guns blazing, but they’ll have to endure months of bashing both in the press and on the stock market, hopefully that billion dollars from Microsoft will keep them in the game until then.

By: alan lindsay

alan lindsay — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 09:05:08 +0000

Gruber’s response is only interesting because of the astonishing levels of defensiveness and retraction.

By: Michael Parekh

Michael Parekh — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 08:53:00 +0000

Separately, let’s not forget how Research in Motion Osbourned itself by announcing that the Blackberry OS is a dead-end and the future is QNX on it’s smartphones.

By: superalias

superalias — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 07:41:03 +0000

“Let’s hope Nokia is the exception.”

sfmitch had the right response to that: Why hope that Nokia is an exception? If they sink with this, their technologies will find homes elsewhere, as will their talented employees. Life will go on.

Besides, a Nokia win here implies a Microsoft win. Who in the world needs that?

By: Don

Don — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 06:52:13 +0000

Well, some pundits have asked why Microsoft announced Windows 8 at this time. Could MS be trying to get consumers to stop thinking about Chrome and Android? From all accounts, Windows 7 has been getting fairly good reviews and MS osborne’s it for an OS that may not ship for 18 months.

By: BrandXtra

BrandXtra — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 02:54:04 +0000

http://www.brandhub.com/blog/can-nokia-rise-once-again/

By: Fafnir

Fafnir — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:46:08 +0000

What percentage of Nokia’s shares did Microsoft had bought when the agreement was announced (Feb 11th)? By the drop of its price it seems the other shareholders think the ogre is good at swapping value.

By: Randall "Texrat" Arnold

Randall "Texrat" Arnold — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:34:09 +0000

One of the best opinion pieces I’ve read on this subject. Well done.

By: Walt French

Walt French — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 20:41:57 +0000

“But he also makes two crucial mistakes: He blames Nokia employees… and then he implies that Nokia is open to … ‘how we either build, catalyze or join an ecosystem.’ ”
.
These “mistakes” were necessary to justify the massive disruption, the discontinuation of his predecessors’ efforts to build out a modern ecosystem. It is reasonable to question whether the desperately unequal partnership with Microsoft WAS indeed the best course, but it is also reasonable to argue that he was hired to do just that, i.e., that any alternative would have breached his contract with the Nokia board.
.
It is also true that if Nokia were merely sitting in Busineess As Usual mode today, Android phones would be gutting the sales of their “mainstream” feature phones. Horace D argues that dealers and the blogosphere/cognoscenti see the abandonment of Symbian and tilt customers towards some future direction, but I think retail sales are far too opportunistic to be heavily driven by that. And there really never was that much hope that Symbian would catch up, anyway.

By: ctyrider

ctyrider — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 20:07:24 +0000

Another brilliant article from my favorite blog.

I think if Nokia survives this transition and starts shipping innovative WP7 and Win8 based products – they will be a very formidable competitor to Apple and various Android makers. Hardware design wise, Nokia is probably 2nd only to Apple. They bring a lot to the table here, in a way that HTC, Samsung, and even HP simply cannot. I personally cannot wait to see what they cook up with Mango, and down the road with Windows 8.

By: N8nNC

N8nNC — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 19:10:34 +0000

I think it’s the difference between an upstart strategy/mistake and an incumbent/monopoly mistake. The upstart feels/worries their current offering isn’t compelling enough, and touts their future. They can turn this from a mistake, if they execute and deliver on-time and on-spec. Too often they don’t. As an upstart they possess little reputation, and this misstep costs them all of it.

The incumbent worries that their next won’t be as profitable/dominating as their current OR is complacent, assuming that they’ll succeed no matter what. This can be comforting confidence in a well-charted course or arrogance ignoring changed reality. But, again, the real test is execution. The example in my mind isIBM – still a large, profitable company but nowhere near its dominant self of the 60s-80s.

By: PXLated

PXLated — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 15:41:14 +0000

It isn’t Cringely that says they were “out competed”, it’s Mike McCarthy who was actually at Osborne. So, who we gonna believe?

By: sfmitch

sfmitch — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 15:21:33 +0000

“Let’s hope Nokia is the exception.”

Why would we hope Nokia is the exception?

I think it would be very interesting if Nokia crashes and burns. It would also be interesting if their plan works and they are able to successfully transition to WP7.

“As expected, our two critics are taken to task by Jared Newman:”

Gruber’s response is worth the read: http://daringfireball.net/2011/06/ice_water_enthusiast