Nokia: two years after the Windows Phone adoption

posted by Victor H. / Feb 14, 2013, 6:34 AM

Nokia: two years after the Windows Phone adoption

It feels like yesterday when we heard Nokia chief executive Stephen Elop shock the industry with his announcement that the then world’s largest feature and smartphone maker will adopt Windows Phone as its main smartphone platform, and jump off the ‘burning platform’ Symbian.

The exact date was February 11th, and the announcement came with the usual Microsoft aplomb, this time adopted by Nokia:

"There are other mobile ecosystems. We will disrupt them.
There will be challenges. We will overcome them.
Success requires speed. We will be swift.
Together, we see the opportunity, and we have the will, the resources and the drive to succeed."

How well is that going? Two years after it started its huge transformation, it’s time to recap Nokia's situation and face the facts. Two years ago, Nokia said 2011 and 2012 will be the transitional years, and now in 2013 it can no longer blame that transformational period for slow sales.

Nokia's smartphone market share has dwindled drastically in the past two years.

The company has ‘optimized’ workforce (a bureaucratic term for cutting jobs), sold non-core assets (like Nokia’s headquarters in Finland, which the company is now leasing), slashed R&D, and saw a huge outflow of top-level management and talent.

Nokia’s camera guru Damian Dinning has left, Nokia’s sales head quit and the whole management was reorganized.

All of that has happened in a monumental effort towards Nokia’s Windows Phone Lumia smartphones. Unfortunately, the fruits of that labor are little. Nokia sold a record 4.4 million Lumias in the Holiday quarter, but that record looked paltry against 47.8 million iPhones sold in the same period, ten times as many as the Lumias.

Actually, looking at the whole of 2012, you’d still see Symbian, the 'burning platform', outsold Windows Phone-based Lumias by a huge margin. Nokia sold around 21.8 million Symbian devices against only some 13.3 million Lumias in 2012.

Reality struck catastrophically in 2012 as Nokia posted record losses, only swinging back to a slight profit in Q4 2012. Once the undisputed leader and innovator in smartphones, often considered creator of the smartphone, Nokia’s market share collapsed to 5.1% of the market cannibalized by Samsung that rose by more than 50%.

From a market leader with 33.7% of the smartphone market in 2010, Nokia held only 5.1% of the market in 2012.

2012 Smartphone market share by vendor

Data courtesy of Communities Dominates Brands.

What’s worse is that its main platform, Windows Phone, grabbed a measly 2% share of all smartphones sold in 2012. BlackBerry, Symbian and even bada all outsold it this year. We’re not even comparing this with the market leader Android and the only close runner-up, iOS.

Nokia has tried to refocus on the North American market, but even at its best, the company sold only 1 million Lumias in a quarter when Apple sold 18 million iPhones in the same period. That is outselling Nokia 18 to 1, a number that leaves comments out.

Back in February 2011, Nokia’s chief executive stated numerous times “It’s now a three-horse race.” The reality of the situation however could not be further away from the truth. Globally, Android is running the smartphone show and Apple is playing catch-up.

Nokia has lost key markets like China, and could not conquer the new ones it wanted like North America. Windows Phone is also not getting much traction with customers.

Nokia is preparing to finally deliver its supposed savior, a true PureView smartphone (where by true we mean one with a huge sensor and unmatched all-around quality like the 808 PureView) for MWC, but the situation has changed. As exciting as it sounds, it could be too little and too late for the company to claim back its spot in the lead.

2012 Smartphone market share by platform

Data courtesy of Communities Dominate Brands.

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139 Comments

1. Wiki_jaan

Posts: 704; Member since: Jun 24, 2012

sammy rocking.................................

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 6:39 AM 27

44. SamsungFan

Posts: 201; Member since: Apr 16, 2012

Samsung always rockzz....

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 9:36 AM 13

71. Wiki_jaan

Posts: 704; Member since: Jun 24, 2012

hy s-fan u know............... haters every where

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 12:13 PM 1

137. SamsungFan

Posts: 201; Member since: Apr 16, 2012

Hmmmm

posted on Feb 21, 2013, 11:08 AM 0

51. sayedejaz

Posts: 24; Member since: Feb 05, 2013

Uff SAMSUNG 215 MILLION :O Now i understud why apple sueingg them :S It is the only company making dangerous for them ..

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 10:25 AM 11

59. sayedejaz

Posts: 24; Member since: Feb 05, 2013

Prediction For 2013 300+ million - Samsung 97+ million - Apple Thus Samsung became ' CHAMPION ' ( shortage of words to describe samsung :( )

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:34 AM 3

100. appleeedooownnn

Posts: 3; Member since: Feb 14, 2013

YOU GOT TO BE KIDDING ME... 97+ Million.... apple??? C'mon... If you see the graph, and follow news, you'll know that apple already hit their ceiling. People area moving away from iphone 4/4s/5 into GS3 & Note2. 2013 is a VERY CRITICAL year for Apple. I bet apple only sell around 50 million unit and becoming number 6. 1. samsung 2. huawei 3. sony 4. zte 5. lenovo 6. apple

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 7:18 PM 1

136. BitterTruth unregistered

ZTE and Lenovo? Are you kidding? What about HTC, Nokia and Motorola?

posted on Feb 20, 2013, 1:30 PM 0

61. Johnnokia

Posts: 1158; Member since: May 27, 2012

Watch this name Victor. H ... Almost 98% of the articles against Nokia and Windows Phone are written by him. Phonearena ,, I'm an old user here and I'm asking you to fire Victor H. as soon as possible. Otherwise, you would loose your strong credibility. Guys, before thumbing me down, just have a look on the article's archive and pick any anti- Nokia or Windows Phone article, then ... WATCH WHO IS THE EDITOR >>>>>>> VICTOR. H

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:36 AM 5

65. Wiki_jaan

Posts: 704; Member since: Jun 24, 2012

dont blame him.............. blame elop

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:43 AM 4

66. Johnnokia

Posts: 1158; Member since: May 27, 2012

I'm blaming Flop all the time, but this guy has nothing here just writing anti- Nokia articles.. Watch the archive and you will know that I'm right.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:46 AM 3

73. NexusKoolaid

Posts: 493; Member since: Oct 24, 2011

Whether or not you're correct about how he covers the subjects of Nokia and Windows Phone is irrelevant. What matters is whether or not he has his facts straight. If he's inaccurate, call him out on it, and back it up with facts of your own. Otherwise if he's correct, then it's news.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 12:45 PM 5

90. UrbanPhantom

Posts: 949; Member since: Oct 30, 2012

Old news is often as misleading as incorrect news. Why not tell all the facts? Also, if WP8 is so terrible, then explain why Nokia sold twice as many Lumias as the previous quarter? Like I said before, OLD NEWS.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 5:26 PM 1

93. jroc74

Posts: 6023; Member since: Dec 30, 2010

The thing about old news...it shows the rapid rise of the iPhone and Android in about 2 years for each platform. It also shows the rapid decline of the old Win Mo and BB....and the death of Palm. All within 2 years. This article is also about a 2 year span. 3 years if you count WP. See a pattern? I find it extremely hard to believe that WP phones before Nokia were sooo bad...that Nokia is coming to save the day for WP. You wanna compare the first WP devices to the first Android ones? The first WP devices were like the iPhone 4 or GS 2 and 3 compared to the first Android devices. Especially the OS. The iPhone 4 is a nice phone. The OS was nice too. I had a RAZR, and I had to load up 1.6 on my Droid 1....and I barely touched it after. Anyone wanna talk about lag and Android..I invite you to use my phone with 1.6. Eeww...lol. Android has come such a long way since 2008...amazing lil OS it is.... Android grew so much in 2 years...WP...not so much. There was and still isnt a mass switch of Android users to WP. I keep saying....it is what it is. I still say give WP 3 more years....before we yell FAIL. Might as well say the same thing for Nokia running WP.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 6:18 PM 3

68. No_Nonsense unregistered

Let's not get personal here. The sole reason why WP is lacking because ex-Symbian users are not moving to the platform because of its limitations and certain guys won't move from the 800/900 to the 920/620/820 thanks to the sort of terrible experience they've had with WP7.x. Obviously, that's not to say the move to WP is stupid, but yes, WP needs to be better to help Nokia gain back its original crown. Long story short, Nokia needs to find a way to provide functionality to WP aka customize WP to make Symbian/MeeGo users gain entry to the platform. The hardware is generally very good, but ex Nokia owners won't move to WP if they fail to find all what was there in Symbian/MeeGo, Besides, this dumb US only strategy/focus needs to stop.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:51 AM 3

76. nasznjoka

Posts: 418; Member since: Oct 05, 2012

i think he is so 'touched' by the fact that nokia's failure is due to the lack of strong platform, and you can not say that he is writing articles against nokia while he provides the facts, NUMBER DON'T LIE MAN

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 2:31 PM 4

89. UrbanPhantom

Posts: 949; Member since: Oct 30, 2012

The numbers do lie, because they are old numbers, and Nokia recently made a profit for Q4...

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 5:22 PM 2

102. appleeedooownnn

Posts: 3; Member since: Feb 14, 2013

lies, damn lies... Q4 profit is from BB paying license fee + selling HQ + getting money for whoring with micfosoft That's the reason nokia say that Q1 2013 it will be back in RED.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 7:22 PM 2

101. appleeedooownnn

Posts: 3; Member since: Feb 14, 2013

Victor H. WERE NET writing an anti nokia article ELOP were writing an anti nokia history

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 7:21 PM 1

2. rusticguy

Posts: 2828; Member since: Aug 11, 2012

Eflop one of the most efficient zombie/virus ever released ... if you couldn't do it in 2 years you cannot do it ever. Compare with Android ... and accept that not many like WIN-DOZ.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 6:42 AM 17

62. Johnnokia

Posts: 1158; Member since: May 27, 2012

Watch this name Victor. H ... Almost 98% of the articles against Nokia and Windows Phone are written by him. Phonearena ,, I'm an old user here and I'm asking you to fire Victor H. as soon as possible. Otherwise, you would loose your strong credibility. Guys, before thumbing me down, just have a look on the article archive and pick any anti- Nokia or Windows Phone article, then ... WATCH WHO IS THE EDITOR >>>>>>> VICTOR. H

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 11:36 AM 5

104. papss unregistered

Agreed.. They really do have monkeys writing articles

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 7:53 PM 0

3. maccess

Posts: 742; Member since: Jan 16, 2013

wp brings nothing except "fancy" UI.. android forever..

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 6:49 AM 19

30. volcano

Posts: 348; Member since: Jan 25, 2013

android bring nothing except lag, malware, ads, ugly UI and stolen apps from developers effort

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 8:01 AM 21

31. maccess

Posts: 742; Member since: Jan 16, 2013

uhm yeah.. my t-mobile g1 was like that..

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 8:13 AM 1

32. lovefist unregistered

whatever makes you sleep at night grandpa.

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 8:28 AM 6

82. volcano

Posts: 348; Member since: Jan 25, 2013

my child im giving an advice android isn't worth your money

posted on Feb 14, 2013, 5:09 PM 3

91. maccess

Posts: 742; Member since: Jan 16, 2013

please stop making yourself sounds stupid kid.. my s3 can do everything even more than your windows phone can dream about... even all of android phone can have that "fancy" UI of your wp with launcher 8 if you thing android has ugly UI.. most of high end or latest android phone never lag ( specialy since 4.1 jelly bean )... malware just like a myth for me cause i never had once at all.. just try to grow up kid.. that 's my advice for you..