Rebuilding Nokia from Within
There’s a nice little read over at FT.COM, tweeted by @benwood. It’s written by Andrew Hill who discusses restructuring of policies and actions going on internally at Nokia.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9ec857b6-65f7-11e0-9d40-00144feab49a.html#axzz1JTfUGH6Y
A month ago in an interview, Nokia’s CEO, Stephen Elop said, “We are moving at a speed that is unparalleled for our company and I would argue that is on par with anyone else in the industry.”
As you know, Nokia was, and partly is like a pyramid. Each layer above is your boss and someone else to say no to your ideas. That’s to the point that well, it never actually reaches the people who can actually decide to make things happen. This results in delays. An inability to react. The ability (or inability) for Nokia to adapt quickly enough is what has caused Nokia to begin parting ways with our beloved Symbian, taking steps back from Maemo-MeeGo, and meekly embrace Windows Phone.
Jo Harlow tells Andrew that internally, a lot of anger has come from the fact that were Nokia able to transition more quickly they would not be in this position. In a recent post, Jo Harlow has said that it was now easier to Go Windows Phone than continue with Symbian.
In the world of consumer electronics, particularly mobile devices, swift and fast delivery is key. Whilst you wait to release your product, you’ve been leap-frogged 10 times over and it’s a downward spiral of catching up, unless what you are going to deliver is so huge and game changing. Too much thinking into the long term game, you fail to address the attack from underneath your feet that might prevent you from implementing those decisions years into the future.
Stripping Out Bureaucracy
Elop wants to make Nokia:
- Faster
- More Transparent
- More accountable
resulting in hopefully restored (?) agility. He ackowledges the challenge at the low end from the Chinese who are “cranking out handsets faster than Nokia can put together a presentation” (joked by a Nokia employee, not Elop).
An ex manager said that the Group Executive Board was a symbol of incompetence. These series of commitees and boards have been swept away.
“And the number of processes, of committees, agencies and boards, agencies and commissions – all these people spending time contemplating instead of aggressively moving forward is something we are already fundamentally changing”
“when you look at the things that slow you down – like length of decision-making, confused missions between teams – those are problems we can solve . . . We were in a leadership team meeting and someone said ‘OK, we’ve got this issue to deal with: what’s the expected date?And someone else said, ‘Well, that’s probably going to take three or four weeks’. It’s like ‘Hey, guys, we can’t take three or four weeks on this one. We need to be looking at it in seven days’ – so that’s what we’re going to do.”
The Microsoft deal is expected to be finalised by the end of the month. Nokia hasn’t just chosen Windows Phone, or chosen to let go of Symbian, they have taken the necessary steps within the company’s core that makes sure they are now going to be at a stage where they can react more quickly, deliver on promises. It’s going to be an extremely difficult task . Whilst the competition is merely doing finishing touches, Nokia is resetting the foundation, rebuilding the walls, placing the roof, ordering the tiles and paint etc.
Category: MeeGo, Nokia, Nseries, Rant, Symbian, Windows Phone
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Hey, thanks for reading my post. My name is Jay and I'm a medical student at the University of Manchester. When I can, I blog here at mynokiablog.com and tweet now and again @jaymontano. We also have a twitter and facebook accounts @mynokiablog and facebook.com/MyNokiaBlog. Contact us at tips(@)mynokiablog.com or email me directly on jay[at]mynokiablog.comSubscribe
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Good article
Demolishing Nokia from within…
Stop sobbing already, it’s not like Elop came in to your house and stole your TV or something. Just by another brand and STFU.
stop ranting LOL
but how do you think the finnish feel, some foreign guy came out of no where and fucked up the whole company and is slowly pushing them in to a hardware company and North American Based company
I’am a fin and last time i checked it was the old management who destroyed Nokia.
Elop haven’t even started yet and he has made more things happen than the absolutely horrible OPK in +5 years.
It needed somebody from outside to finally stop the ludicrous Symbian development.
I’m sad about the loss of Qt and good possibility that Harmattan and Qt will be totally driven to the ground, but it was clear that real shakeup was needed. I don’t know why i need to even answer to posts like this. I mean Nokia fan base has shrinken to the extreme fans that’s are sitting at the bottom of the lake.
To people who truly still like Nokia and i’m still very much waiting for N950, plus they are still the company i follow even if the products i buy wont be from them before they got their things together.
Vanjoki was the best of the finnish guys to run the show, but at this point it was time to take outsider. If Vanjoki was chosen as CEO when he was close to it already years ago and not OPK, who knows things might have not needed to go this far.
let’s W8 and see…
Oh, W8…
I don’t care. Just bring me that portrait Qwerty keyboard now!.
i have to agree that it is faster
so much work from nokia has been leaked
windows phones almost made
symbian ui rereshed
symbian pr2
meego phones?
Things were supposed to get faster with symbian ^3 anyways. When Avkon gets ditch and QT takes place software development and impovements and UI tweaks are going to come a lot faster.
Not sure if Elop has anything to do with it but he sure will take the credit.
> Whilst the competition is merely doing finishing touches, Nokia is resetting the foundation [etc..]
I disagree with that first part completely. How are the competition in any way merely doing finishing touches? Apple and Google have spent the last several years desperately racing to add the features, stability and battery life that Symbian has enjoyed long before them, and still enjoys in more advanced form today.
It is EXTREMELY short sighted for anyone to look at the slick UI layer on Symbian’s rivals and think that’s the whole story, it’s not – it’s just the surface. Like an iceberg, 9/10ths is below the surface.
From an organisational point of view, Nokia is indeed reorganising, but Google and Apple (and def. MS with WinPho) will have had to undergo considerable growth and reorganisation in their mobile development teams to compete with each other, and with the far and away market leader since smartphones were invented – Nokia (and they were invented by Nokia remember, which bodes well for Nokia leading the next disruption too).
While I am scathing about how crap WinPho really is underneath the surface UI, I recognise it was a good idea to perhaps introduce some phones with it on. What is Nokia’s biggest mistake is to intend (and publicly state) that they are ditching Symbian, which is the market leading mobile OS by far and will have 300 million users by mid-to-end-2012. The one hope for some sanity being restored is that Symbian now has no definite end of life and will see further improvement.
I still do not see how Nokia/MS hope to make WinPho competitive with Symbian. And look at that from the ordinary user’s point of view, who do not know phone tech. They want great battery life, signal quality, low cost, and then more functionality and more available apps are added bonuses. NO ONE can honestly say that today Symbian is not far in advance of WinPho in those areas. And the S^3 UI is not so slow that WinPho being slightly slicker makes that much difference. Nokia have a HUUUUUGE mountain to climb to make WinPho as good as Symbian – and remember that is another competitor for their WinPho phones.
That is what all you WinPho fanboys forget, how far in advance Symbian is of ANYTHING else on the market from the perspective of ordinary folk in the street (and hey we can bring cameras into it too where there is no contest with Nokia).
–”That is what all you WinPho fanboys forget, how far in advance Symbian is of ANYTHING else on the market from the perspective of ordinary folk in the street ”
That’s why ordinary people are walking around with iPhone’s and HTC’s huh
In vastly less numbers than Symbian. But you’re American so obviously you only have that very limited American view given Symbian is not strong in the US. And before anyone says the numbers are due to installed base, note that Symbian sales were far in advance of EVERY other smartphone platform up to and including the last quarter for sales figures.
I think I’ve made my point
I’ll put in the European voice then.
I see an enormous amount of iPhone’s here. Next there is Samsung with mainly Galaxy S and then you see a lot of HTC Legends and Desire’s and now Desire HD’s.
Symbian devices I see mostly in the shape of E71′s and the likes. Sometimes I come across a lonesome N97 or X6 and they are mostly cursed by their users and will change to something else, most likely one of the most seen platforms/brands.
And to be honest, I never came across any WP7 device in real life so far. Uptake of it is very small, very very small.
But so is current uptake of Symbian, it’s even pushed out of most stores here. Only C7 and N8 are promoted a slight bit. There are far more HTC’s and Samsung available to try in stores.
All the above says something I think, and that’s not based on me being slightly cross with Symbian. Just general perception.
Just come with you hatin’ I don’t mind, but this is what I see and can conclude that Symbian is dying amongst the general public and Nokia will to if they stay with it.
That is the exact same thing here (UK)
I have encountered folks with HTC HD. Only other windows device I’ve seen.
With Symbian I see a lot of N97 mini or E71/E72. See a lot of basic Nokias as well. Too true about the X6. All the users I’ve met using them curse that thing but are trapped in a contract and can’t get rid of it. It’s so confusing to use and is made 10 times worse with carrier ‘optimisation’.
Majority of the time, I see iPhones (The “standard in UK perception of what is the end all and be all of smartphones -_-) and Blackberrys, dotted around with a myriad of Androids (Desire mostly, some GS).
4-5 years ago, all you ever see was Nokia, rare samsung and a v3.
Forgot about BB, that’s an utter rage over here. Purely for BBM and ping capabilities.
What is often forgotten by the ‘Symbian Faboys’ (sorry for the name) here is that Nokia destroyed Symbian with S60v5. Not so much for off contract buyers but for the ones that got stuck into a 2 year contract expecting something good from Nokia.
After the debacle they had with S60v5 they probably will never buy Nokia/Symbian again.
Yes, Symbian has a lot of functionality but it’s not what the big chunk of buyers use. They want it work good and easy. There are the power users that like Symbian and are well able to use it but that category is not the category that generates revenue for Nokia.
Therefor I believe Elop say something similar and realized a ginat break was necessay. Perception of Nokia devices needed to change. WP7 is as much of a change as any.
So Rant and Jay, you are SERIOUSLY saying to me that I should take your own personal testimonies (a grand total of 2 people) over the recorded facts of sales and stats of hundreds of millions of phones of all models across the globe?
Seems like you have just made a last desperate attempt to win an argument you have already lost.
I am not “hatin’”. I am stating to you unarguable sales facts and figures.
What you guys see in person is utterly, and totally irrelevant to this situation. I could live on a desert island and claim I saw no one running windows phone, android, or iphones. So what!?
lowend – china
mid – nokia
high end- nokia especially the n8 , n8 is huge here in pakistan .iv’e seen people sell there iphone 4′s and androids for it.
Do you not realize that the majority of people buying Symbian do so because they either don’t know better, pricing is ridiculously low and/or it’s NOT being used as a smartphone in the conventional sense.
I’ve been using Symbian as my SOLE smartphone platform for in excess of 4 years so don’t preach crap to me about my being American having anything to do with my disposition.
PS. I was born in the US, grew up in the Caribbean and have a ton of Brits as friends and family.
Imagine the best mobile phone hardware, Nokia, running the best mobile platform OS, Android. Why couldn’t it happen? Too much pride on Nokia’s side is gonna shut them down.
Because then Nokia would have a hard time trying to make a difference to other Android manufactures, and lose massive amounts of profit to rival Google etc etc. Why is it so hard to understand?
With Wp7 Nokia can at least be a little bit different against other Wp7-makers due to deeper relations with MS + they can change the OS more than others if they wish to do so.
Android is FAR from the best mobile OS. In everything it does, it’s a poor-man’s Symbian, a pale imitation of Symbian.
If Symbian is the real deal, the premium product, Android is the equivalent of the cheap Chinese rip-off – sort of looks the same, sort of works kind of similar, some of the time, not as good at all.
Android is open source and the most flexible OS. Nokia is losing market share because of Symbian. Majority of former Symbian users have already jumped to Android. Nokia makes the best hardware but they suck in software development. And that is what ex-Symbian users are waiting for, a combination of excellent hardware with excellent OS, a Nokia device with Android OS. Nokia will actually kill every competition if only decided to go the Android route. Having used the best OS already, I don’t think people will ever be swayed to go back to a second best. Windows Phone will never be as flexible, limitless and open source as Android.
You repeated yourself from your post above, so I’m going to repeat my reply:
Android is FAR from the best mobile OS. In everything it does, it’s a poor-man’s Symbian, a pale imitation of Symbian.
If Symbian is the real deal, the premium product, Android is the equivalent of the cheap Chinese rip-off – sort of looks the same, sort of works kind of similar, some of the time, not as good at all.
For once I agree with Smith, Android is far from the best. Security leaks and power hungry doesn’t make it the best.
And besides that, Nokia would have to make something like HTC Sense to set themselves apart. With the slow development rate they have they could never pull that off.
Nokia is better of with WP, I think Samsung and certainly LG will drop WP like a brick when Nokia comes in and focus all their effort on Android. Most importantly it’s free, and naturally raises revenue for the MFR.
And why is an Open Source OS always the best? I don’t understand why? MAC OS and Windows are both closed and MAC OS is hailed as the best. If Open Source is so good, then were is Linux as a widespread desktop OS?
“If Open Source is so good, then were is Linux as a widespread desktop OS?”
And I could ask you if Android is far from the best why is it booming in popularity?
Popular does not necessarily equal good.
In saying that all you symbian fanboys (talking to Smith here) need to ask yourself why it gets absolutely panned in every single review online and is about to become extinct if it is so hot shit…
The succes of Android lies in it’s price: Free, the ease to skin it and the freedom that is given by Google.
There is no other OS out there that has that. Since MFR’s go for profit rather than the best it somewhat explains the succes of Android.
because its the newest “in” thing… just like fashion is…
popularity != best… do you agree that Mc Donalds has the best burgers??
There are no Best/Godly OS ever… it comes to user preference.
open source OS were never polished and pushed out by big companies. The first open source OS that is successful is Android and that’s because it has google in his back.
Again, if Android is so bad and WP is so good how come android has such a big grow, but I can’s say the same thing about WP.
Also android being open source can benefit from various hardware vendors: it supports CPU from nvidia, qualcomm, TI.. etc while going with WP you stick with qualcomm. Now every OEM has different deals with different hardware components manufactures and this might be a bad thing for WP. The good thing is that it eliminates the fragmentation.
Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t have much hope in the old strategy: Symbian+meego . I think developing 2 OS is stupid. They should have focused more on maemo in 2007 when first iphone was released, instead of trying to adapt symbian for touch screens and create symbian fondation.
Now, Nokia realized that they have no future with symbian, and probably meego is far from being finished, so they need to switch to another os.
It’s ok that they switch to WP, but since they now become a hardware company why not build android too. Why do you need to be exclusive to WP?
and why do nokia thinks they will sell more phones with WP then with Android.
The last 2 question I think Elop needs to come with a good answer.
Android didn’t see such a big growth rate in it’s early days. I think it’s too early to call WP a failure or a mediocre seller.
First of WP is only available in a few languages and the Marketplace is only limited accessable. Uptake from operators is then naturally low and won;t push devices as hard.
With Mango and the months after that I think it’s more fair to pass judgement on the either fail or succes of WP.
Whether Nokia will be succesful with WP remains to be seen. I do believe though that they have seen more of the future roadmap than we have seen so far with only Mango.
Couple that with the ‘be different’ part of WP and the financial incentive from MS and it clarifies Nokia’s choice.
All speculation though.
I hope you’re right, because the current state of WP doesn’t impress too much, and I’m talking about mango version.
Also the design of the UI is not so good. I asked a few of my friends(the ones that are not so much interested in gadgets) and they said it’s not looking very good and I have to agree with them, however I found some people who like the UI.
I guess we shall see next year on this time how good nokia will be.
Ive said this before, but the hard part of the WP7 adoption is that it was on the same timeline as MeeGo was (there is no time savings!) for anything other than vanilla WP7
And
WebOS would have made so much more sense if there really was no bias. Ovi compliments everything that WebOS lacks, and QT works with WebOS.
So they would be releasing products with EVERYTHING that symbian has, including a large App Store.
Tell me how that doesnt make sense.
I highly doubt if MeeGo can be market ready by the end of this year.
By that I mean appealing to the end user, fluid to use and offers a decent amount of usability.
I don;t really follow MeeGo development, but it appears not much has happened over the past 6 months. But I could be wrong there.
@Jim:
Nokia did say something a while back that they were not pursueing tablets.
But then again they also said MeeGo was coming.
Most of the MeeGo development seems to be progressing quickly. This last year alot was changed underneath (eg for qt and to get it working perfectly with medfield). Features are moving along quickly now, but my time estimates are completely Nokia’s own, both before and after Elop.
Also windows tablets will not be ready until 2012 , so.. nokia will probably have 0 marketshare on tablets.
linux is much better then the both but apple and MS have to control linux cause it’s free and they don’t benifit from a free OS
that’s why MS and Apple of linux cause of it’s freedom
i’ve been using ubuntu for a year and used 2 versions 9.04 and now i’ve moved to 10.10 and it’s much more organized then the both and free and as well worked on and developed more frequent
ubuntu gets 1 update every 3 months and 2- 3 small ones in between and as well it uses less CPU speed and 1/4 the RAM windows uses and it just works better
and the people that use linuxOSs will tell you the same thing it’s the most efficient OS on the market but because there so many versions and smaller communities and as well it’s free no on will really make money out of it
If there really was accountability, Mary McDowell would not still be working at Nokia. Everything she touches turns to crap.
so they decide to fire symbian instead of management
LG to make meego phone! happy meego fans
yuppi! but lg do crappy phones… i want a solid nokia meego phone! WP7 grow more faster than android and iOS does look at the market app and the developer involved look the upgrade coming! And it’s fast, very very fast!
LG phones are not crappy. It’s just that their good phones never get out of Korea =_=
there are now 2 big problems they have
1:-iphone
2:-(not google but) samsung galaxy s 2 and 3
now with wp7 there are no real good outstanding phones
here comes nokia to save the day
IF I was boss….I would switch to Agile development, dump 50 percent of the Admin staff, give MeeGo every resource they need, and release a MeeGo phone similar to the N8 only using Intel’s latest chipset on Dec 12th.
Next year I would add an embedded laser projector, and target rolling out indoor location awareness and decent looking integrated HUD’s by the end of 2012, with adoptation by 2013.
Guys talking about android wp7 and symbian dont forget wat the real deal was . Nokia joining wp is temporary , do u get this its not forever after nokia is workin on everythin now meego is ther maemo is there symbian is there and now wp is there . And nokia ms is a temporary partnership after a few years nokia s next disruption is gonna come so till then guys we need to chill we hav symbian maemo meego wp choose which ever u like . And i would say tat android is complete shit its just a rip off of ios wat good is it , it has the worst battery performance me being symbian fan personally hate android
There is nothing new here. Many corporations grew too big and need to change to get more nimble, agile and fast. It was common knowledge that Nokia has an execution problem (another term for disfunctional organization and clogged up decision channels).
In Nokia’s case however I question the wisdom of changing product strategy (Windows instead of QT), pissing off the very people that deliver the phones (no, not management, but the rank and file developer and HW designer, etc), pissing off customers (Maemo community and many Symbian fans), relinquishing control to Redmond re services (app store, Ovi –> Bing maps), etc.
To be successful two major things need to happen for Elop: 1) Organizational transformation must go well and fast, and 2) WinPhone needs to be a success with customers.
Which leads me back to my opinion: There is no way Nokia can thrive without organizational transformation, but why load the process with the additional challenge to bet the farm on a system that is way behind on the market (Windows Phone), has no apparent benefit compared to iOS but is as closed as the Apple product, and is light years behind Android and Symbian in regards to market penetration.
Why WP and not QT, Mr. Elop?
cause he’s a trojan horse,there to push Qt and symbianOS down and trying to raise wp7
(burning platform) Ditch symbian, mowe to windows phone like fire my house and go to the neighbor house. This is wrong. I say to nokia Group Executive Board fire the elop from nokia and do not fire the symbian best platform. Symbian is outdated but pr2 and pr3 will be the good updates.
Something so sclerotic must die. We can be nostalgic all we want but our nostalgia will not rescusitate. If only a more competent (not ms!) would buy them up? Expensive at the mo but wait and see.
Having said that, I’m still sad and, perhaps, grieving. No, definately!
Nokia is anything but a pyramid, it has matrix organisation which is different from a Pyramid…
Matrix organization has also pros and cons. And one of the cons is the lack of accountability.