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Microsoft In Talks To Buy Nokia's Smartphone Division?
lightbox32 writes "Analyst Eldar Murtazin announced today that Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer was soon to meet his Nokia counterpart Stephen Elop to finalize the purchase of Nokia's smartphone division, which would see patents, staff, and some plants transferred to Microsoft, for an undisclosed price. From the article: '“Steve Ballmer, Andy Lees and Stephen Elop and Kai Ostamo will meet in Las Vegas to finalize agreement about Nokia smartphone unit. Bye Nokia,” he tweeted on Thursday morning."
Nokia already said that they won't sell their smartphone division several hours ago. Why is this rumor still echoed on slashdot?
This story has been photoshopped. You can tell by the pixels and the smoke coming out of the track.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Go tell your OEMs that you are not a competitor? Gee, that will really make them want to leave Android for Windows Phone Mango. lol
Go look up OS/2 would be my advice. OS/2 beat the crap out of Windows 3.1 and even Windows 95. No OEM would touch it as IBM was a competitor.
http://saveie6.com/
They really do want to be Apple don't they. :)
First the Microsoft stores, emulating (Badly) the Apple stores.
Now jumping into the phone business.
At least it is entertaining to watch.
If I were God, wouldn't I protect my churches from acts of me?
Given the DOJ and EU battles with Microsoft, surely something like this would undergo some serious review.
Here's hoping such a deal (if it's not just a rumor and actually goes through) doesn't touch Qt. I was happy when Nokia bought it, but I really, really don't want MS to get control over Qt.
I guess it comes down to corporate structure. Is Qt part of the smartphone division? The two are closely related (and it's why Nokia bought Qt to begin with), so I wouldn't be surprised.
Nokia: Look guys, it appears Windows Phone is sinking and we need to ditch it if we want to keep selling phones.
Microsoft: OK, we need phones which run our software so we'll just buy your phones.
Is there any point in posting an unsubstantiated rumour by someone who has previously claimed that the deal was happening back in May and that Nokia's phone division would be sold by the end of 2011? Nokia is predominantly a phone maker, and I really can't see them wanting to sell the main business of their company to anyone. What would be left of the company?
And would Microsoft really want to spend the claimed $19 billion on a division that has yet to prove that anybody wants to buy one of their Windows phones? And Nokia have the connections with the carriers that is required to get the phones into the retail system. Given the way Windows phones haven't really been pushed by the carriers, I would think that they need the sales team at Nokia. Buying the patents and manufacturing plants only solves part of the problem - and that assumes that there is a problem in the first place that requires the purchase.
Finally, I don't think the other phone companies like HTC, LG, and Samsung would feel happy about Microsoft moving into their territory. This sale would only cause friction with those companies, is an expensive risk, and provides no benefit considering that Nokia are already committed to selling Microsoft's platform now.
This is old news. Nokia is already a wholly-owned subsidiary (others would simply say "a zombie") of Microsoft since it got infected with aggressive stage four Elopba.
And everybody knew, at that very moment, that they were dead, they just didn't know it themselves.
So now MS tries to make it official, while Nokia obviously still is in denial,
as everyone would who walks around with no head and the bones hanging out. ^^
It's a story from the old times. The bad times. The same story told with Netscape, Borland, Sun (nearly), plus a ton of other companies where it wasn't that obvious.
The story of the third E in EEE.
It's interesting how the murdering only stopped from the time of their conviction to right after their probation officer left for good.
If MS were a human, they would lock him up forever as a preventative measure.
Next step: Look for what might be the flesh it will start to get hungry for.
P.S.: This would make a really good zombie movie.
I thought they already "bought" Nokia by having their cuckoo-CEO Stephen Elop installed as chief ramrod and bottle washer.
Could this mean that Microsoft isn't sure that Elop is going to stick around and that the board might get rid of him? Oh that would be fun to watch.
--
BMO
Still missing Borg Gates.
Billcutus?
sig: sauer
Slashdot would be much more pleasant if all the headlines that end in question marks were removed.
If this were to happen, what about QT?
The phone division i don't think anyone cares about at this point. I didn't even know there still was one :). But we would NOT want QT to fall into the wrong hands.
But if this is BS like it seems to be.. then who cares.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
As the old saying goes - "Why buy the cow when you're getting the milk for free?"
#DeleteChrome
no siree bob. we /never/ would have even /considered/ bribing the board to get our man appointed so he could run it into the ground, destroy all the value, so we can then buy at a bargain basement price. it never occurred to us.
(can i have my check now please?)
I'm not laughing.. but Microsoft is still a joke. First they pre-announce a super smart phone a year before it's said to be out and now they are trying to buy their way into the smartphone market from another company that can't compete with Apple. How many phones have they already tried to launch that all failed miserably? Yea.. good luck with that. I'm sure the next phone venture will be worth every penny.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats. -HLM
Nokia's strong point (or given their performance lately, least weak point) is very much in their mobile phone business. If you look at their latest quarterly earnings, the net sale of mobile phones decreased (-14% from last) significantly less than their smart phones (-39% from last). On top of that, their smartphone sales dropped significantly in NA since last year, presumably because of the competition in the market and their lack of a real offering lately.
Furthermore, it's pretty clear (as in their only choice at the moment) that they will use Windows Phone as their only smartphone platform and are dropping any commitments to any alternatives they had on the shelf. There is a good chance they will make deep system changes in their ROMs to enhance the experience as well, further enveloping their relationship with them. I doubt they will commit to Android sometime down the line, since (a) Elop has obvious ties with MS and (b) it will be way more work for them to "Nokia"-ize the UI to make it appealing to people like every other manufacturer did.
So what if they sold that division to Microsoft? Their bread-and-butter won't change and won't be influenced by the move. Microsoft won't build any devices; if anything, they will have an easier hand in making sure the hardware gels perfectly with Windows Phone to make the experience as awesome as possible. Both companies would be better positioned to compete with Apple and Android since they will be able to use them as the "Nexus" of Windows Phone and, if they don't step on Nokia's toes, provide an awesome experience that neither company can match AND have manufacturer variety that gives people just enough choice to be appealing without being overwhelming. It's a win-win, though I'm probably being naive and overly simplistic.
I know the news is fake, but I'm really excited about this collaboration. I love Nokia and I think this will finally make them relevant again if they don't let Microsoft run the hardware design show too much. They already did the right thing by setting a tight hardware baseline; Nokia can handle the rest.
Even if this were true (I really have no idea if it is), what would Microsoft stand to gain? I mean, they already effectively control the rotting carcass of Nokia through their puppet Elop.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
They became M$'s bitch the moment they hired an ex-M$ CEO. The only surprise here is why did it take so long?
And would Microsoft really want to spend the claimed $19 billion [businessinsider.com] on a division that has yet to prove that anybody wants to buy one of their Windows phones?
Just to add to this point: Microsoft paid $8.5 billion for Skype, a company that has never made a profit, and is not expected to any time soon. These kind of purchases are strategic, and aim to expand market share indirectly by forming synergies between different products; they don't have to be directly profitable in the short-term.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Too bad, Nokia were the most free-software friendly CE company ever. I don't think there will be others like them anytime soon, seeing how the tides are turning.
They could have shown the way to other manufacturers about how to make really open hardware, and about effectively contributing to upstream projects.
Instead, they ended up on the exactly opposite side of the spectrum of freedom, and their end will be forever associated with... Windows Phone. What a letdown. Sigh.
That really was the next logical step. They've already ruined any hopes of Nokia ever getting back into the game with their mole who turned them on windows mobile as the OS of choice, now taking official control of the mobile arm of Nokia really is nothing new, it's just going the whole nine yards.
Most likely future: MS will pour a couple billions into it, like they did with the xbox, bleeding money quarter after quarter. They will be waiting (and bleeding money) until their competitors make a blunder (like Sony did with the PS3) and then stand ready to take over market share with their 2nd rate product simply because it's there and it has marketing muscle. They will probably buy up a couple App providers along the way and make them windows-mobile-exclusive (hello, Bungie).
Why? Because Balmer has no vision and isn't the guy to come up with anything resembling a new strategy. We will see what we've seen them do virtually everywhere else.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Depends on whether the future is looking inflationary or deflationary.
It's looking deflationary at the moment, barring the FED & ECB, so cash will increase in value.
Can you think of anything your bank wouldn't give you a loan for with 80% down?
Two things.
1. Nokia's market share is not going in the right direction, the earnings may not keep up. Hoarding cash would be rational.
2. Banks are dying, they are not loaning just now, expect to see the next set of fireworks end of Feb, March. They have to increase capital hugely in the next year or two.
Deleted
Billions of liquid dollars and they wait for a fire-sale before they buy Nokia. What a bunch of losers.
"People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware."
This has been one of Microsoft's biggest failings. They can't optimize or change things because of all the hardware vendors that depend on the existing way of doing things.
And they don't get serious enough about the UI to make it great because end-users aren't their real customers, OEMs and IT departments are.
If Nokia became a wholly owned subsidiary of MS and became the primary manufacturer of Windows phones, MS might have a chance to get their software and hardware as a single package act together.
Google has a lot of market penetration with Android, but they are suffering the same fracturing and sub-optimal user experience that Windows faces. Meanwhile Apple happily melds the OS and hardware into a single package and continues make insanely great products (and profits).
- Jasen.
Microsoft's accountants will eventually kill their mobile division just like they kill everything that doesn't generate sufficient cash flow, and that cash flow is considerable.
Microsoft's problems is that they are a victim of their own success.
They never see that they were used by an entire market sector to relieve the hardware OEMs from having to develop any software.
People, end-users, never bought their products. They bought the hardware, but there was no choice as to the software so it wan't a consideration.
They were never liked, they were never sought after, they were never thought about other than as something that came with the hardware.
They have almost no brand loyalty and no market presence (their ubiquity makes them entirely invisible.) Basically, nobody cares.
Unlike Linux, which is sought after by DIY computer geeks and sysadmins looking to squeeze more performance out of their boxen and who buy components from NewEgg or TigerDirect, or Apple products which are sought after by people who care about things other than specs and who make their pilgrimage to the Apple Store experience or buy on-line via iTunes, nobody really wants to put up with the crap Microsoft excretes from its cloaca in Redmond.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
How to acquire a company:
1. Send one of your own executives to be target companies CEO .. loss!)
2. Target company's new CEO implements total dependency on your companies product
3. Target company's share price collapses as they lose market share
4. Acquire target company for cheap
5. Profit! (though possibly in this case
"[Microsoft] is the fox that takes you across the river and then eats you."
- Pete Peterson, former WordPerfect executive
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
It's notable that all those early pocket computer companies failed too. The Psion Revo was an amazing device, is still the only pocket device you can touchtype on, yet Psion left the market in 2001.
But this was an entirely different market. The geek market is half a million people at most.
Apple were aiming to create a new accessory that everybody would have.
Remember Apple first built a sexy MP3 player. At the time, competing MP3 players looked like bricks and had low storage. As a geek, I thought the original iPods with hard disks was a stupid idea - they couldn't cope with jogging and if you compressed music properly you didn't need that much space anyway.
The public didn't know and although adoption was slow, it was fast for a new life accessory.
Somehow, not that many iPods broke. Maybe Apple switched off the hard drive during any shaking. Any high profile scare stories could have killed Apple at that point though..
iPhone was the real breakthrough for Apple. Everyone already had a mobile phone and so it was the natural upgrade for the middle class. Somehow Apple got it in schools and every parent had to buy their parents one.
Nice to see they're working out the important details like who gets to keep which office pot plants after the deal goes through.
When did this person become an "Analyst" instead of blogger?
On the other hand how is one to identify one from another?
There was naturally proof of some kind presented in the story.
If they sell their phone division, what has NOKIA got left?
Isn't that all they make? Phones? GPT and Ericsson are the big players in switching products, not Nokia.
That would mean NO MORE Nokia company as a business.