Full text of Nokia’s Symbian champion layoff – No more Qt for Nokia’s future

On Saturday, there was a post about Nokia ‘Kicking out Symbian Developers’, with one high ranking name in particular, Gravity’s Jan Ole Suhr (@janole) losing his Nokia Developer Champion status.

http://mynokiablog.com/2012/07/21/what-the-hell-nokia-kicking-out-symbian-developers/

To shed a bit more light, this is apparently the letter sent out to the Nokia Champions. It shows a few things. C++/Qt apparently don’t fit into Nokia’s future. No Qt for next billion, No Qt for anything upcoming at Nokia.

However, Nokia are saying that they will not forget these champions. A new partnering programme begins in fall and these champions are automatically added to the programme and a future champion programme can be applied for which their past service will contribute heavily towards the decision.

The letter below was posted as a comment at AAS

“Hello XXXXX,

I wanted to let you know personally that a decision was made to drop Symbian C++ and Qt experts from the Champions program.  You appear to fall in this group.  If you feel you have expertise in other technologies or some experience that would affect your status please write to me.

Below is the standard information as you can see there still are benefits for you.

As you know in June Nokia decided to not pursue a Linux based operating system.  As a result, like the rest of the Nokia family the champions must make cuts to best fulfill the future goals of Nokia. In our opinion your expertise was in Qt or other technologies that do not fit into Nokia’s future and a decision was made to end your Nokia Developer Championship early.

I want to personally thank you for your work as a Nokia Champion over the past few years and let you know that we are not just forgetting you. This fall Nokia Developer will start a new partnering program and you will be automatically added to this program with the option to opt out.  In addition you received this welcome gift and it is yours to use for the life of the device. Finally because of your devotion and dedication to Nokia if you wish to re-apply for the champions program this fall I will be sure to add weight to your application based on your past service.

Your championship will not expire until the end of July.

If you feel there is information that will affect your status please contact me.”

http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/flow/item/15322_Symbian_focused_Nokia_Develope.php#comment-594811665

As AAS’s Rafe Blandford replied:

I understand the decision. It make sense after all, in the context of the strategy switch, but think things could have been better handled (which is the main point I was trying to get across in the article), mainly around cutting things short for some developers.

Source: allaboutsymbian

Cheers Janne for the tip!

Category: Nokia