Well, from a management perspective, Elop's actions (castrating Nokia to just
Symbian and WP) and then the announcement by MS n WP8, is I think a ploy to
beat up Nokia's stock price (now well under $3, when all this drama started it
was over $8) for a cheap MS acquisition via stock. Nokia should still be riding
high on that $10b that MS gave them.
From an engineering perspective, Nokia should have ported Qt to Android as a
first-class SDK for Android, then pushed Qt app development on Android, which
would have eased transition by consumers and developers to Meego or the Linux
flavor of the day. Additionally, they could partner with RIM and or Samsung to
create a third software ecosystem (I'm not including WP, because WP had no
ecosystem back then) After Android was in the bag (or while, when NOK still had
employees) target iOS and do the same thing there. One SDK to rule them all,
one SDK to bring them to Nokia. NOK could have stolen the app development
thunder and become a leader, usurping Apple and Android. People don't care what
their phone runs on, they care about what their phone runs (app wise). With Ovi
store, Nokia could have also opened app stored for desktop apps, and
immediately targeted the two largest markets - the combined desktop markets
(OSX, Win, ... and yes Lin) and the mobile
markets (iOS, Android). Nokia, even without an OS, could have won the mobile
market because it's all about winning developers. And if you write an app, and
then publish it, and reach the Linux desktop user that has a Android phone,
well that's two potential sales right there.
The revenues of the 6(!) platform app store would have really raked it in for
Nokia, and they'd never have to ship a phone.
Qt was the key to becoming relevant. But with the firings Elop has castrated
Nokia and forced the company to suckle the teat of Microsoft, until MS takes
them in for pennies on the dollar. I often think that if ex-Qt engineers got
together and did the work that should have been done by Nokia, they could still
be a serious disruption int he market place. With their own app store, I think
it would be damn profitable, and easily so.
________________________________
From: Atlant Schmidt <aschm...@dekaresearch.com>
To: 'Bo Thorsen' <b...@fioniasoftware.dk>; "interest@qt-project.org"
<interest@qt-project.org>
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2012 9:32 AM
Subject: Re: [Interest] Semi-OT: What could / should Elop / Nokia have done
differently?
Bo:
> But you're missing one important point: No CEO comes in and does
> what Elop did without a clear mandate from the board. He was hired
> specifically to introduce Windows Phone, not the other way around.
I don't disagree with you at all. Nokia was already
a very "Microsoft-friendly" company while I was still
there (as evidenced by how well their phones worked
with PCs and how badly they worked with Macs) and I
wouldn't be surprised to find the Board acted as you
have hypothesized.
Atlant
-----Original Message-----
From: interest-bounces+aschmidt=dekaresearch....@qt-project.org
[mailto:interest-bounces+aschmidt=dekaresearch....@qt-project.org] On Behalf Of
Bo Thorsen
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2012 8:52 AM
To: interest@qt-project.org
Subject: Re: [Interest] Semi-OT: What could / should Elop / Nokia have done
differently?
Hi Atlant,
This was quite a lot better than most of the pretty useless mails in
this thread. (No, this isn't a subtle insult, I think you did pretty well.)
But you're missing one important point: No CEO comes in and does what
Elop did without a clear mandate from the board. He was hired
specifically to introduce Windows Phone, not the other way around. He
started around November and it was only about 9 working weeks later that
the Windows Phone edition was announced. It's *impossible* that this
decision was made after he was hired. Also, why on earth would they have
hired him, if it wasn't because of his ties with MS? This was a board
decision, not Elops.
However, the execution of doing it was done so badly that it's hard to
find comparisons. Tomi wrote that the burning platforms memo would be on
MBA courses as an example of what you should never do. And indeed it was
mentioned in one of my MBA courses this spring :)
Bo.
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