Bob Pritchard from 103.5 Saint John Radio
With all the chatter about the smartphone battle between Apple and Samsung, do you ever wonder what’s happening to the other players in the segment of the market?
RIM, maker of the Blackberry has received a fair amount of visibility as the tumble down the slippery slope of changing technology with layoffs, replacement managers and ongoing delays in getting new product to market.
Another world level player is Nokia. They just announced that they will cut 10,000 positions by the end of next year.
The layoffs are part of a strategy on Nokia’s part to “rescale” its operation, with the closure of a factory in Germany and British Columbia, and a consolidation of other manufacturing operations with a streamlining of their its IT, corporate, and support functions.
Nokia had 122,100 employees at the end of March, including 68,600 at Nokia Siemens Networks.
The layoff announcement comes seven months after the decision to slash 17,000 jobs by 2013 at Nokia Siemens Networks.
But that was just part of the bad news. The company also said that “competitive industry dynamics” in the mobile market are negatively affecting its operation this quarter even more than anticipated. Therefore, it has slashed its Devices & Services operating earnings margin outlook for the second quarter to below negative 3 percent. During the first quarter, Nokia’s margin was negative 3 percent, and it anticipated about the same for the second quarter.
Still, that’s a short-term issue. And according to Nokia, it has a plan to handle its long-term prospects. The key elements of the strategy include investing heavily in its Lumia line of Windows Phone-based smartphones, improving the “competitiveness and profitability” of feature phones, and investing in location-based services.
I suspect that we will be hearing more bad news over the next several quarters.
