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Official: Microsoft To Acquire Nokia Devices and Services Business
Many submitted, and symbolset emailed me to wake up, sending this bit of interesting news out of Redmond: "Microsoft Corporation and Nokia Corporation today announced that the Boards of Directors for both companies have decided to enter into a transaction whereby Microsoft will purchase substantially all of Nokia's Devices & Services business, license Nokia's patents, and license and use Nokia's mapping services. Under the terms of the agreement, Microsoft will pay EUR 3.79 billion to purchase substantially all of Nokia's Devices & Services business, and EUR 1.65 billion to license Nokia's patents, for a total transaction price of EUR 5.44 billion in cash. Microsoft will draw upon its overseas cash resources to fund the transaction. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2014, subject to approval by Nokia's shareholders, regulatory approvals and other closing conditions."
And, yep, Elop is part of the deal (quoting Ballmer): "Stephen Elop will be coming back to Microsoft, and he will lead an expanded Devices team, which includes all of our current Devices and Studios work and most of the teams coming over from Nokia, reporting to me."
A classic Trojan horse manouver pulled off in style by Steven Elop. Now he can go back to Redmond, where they'll hold a Triumph in his honor.
Microsoft succeeded in its strategy to take-down and take-over a major phone rival. First plant a CEO to destroy the company and lower its shares.... wait... and take over the company. What is left of Nokia is not likely to survive as they all had synergies with the devices unit, which will be taken-over by Microsoft.
Clearly, Nokia had problems when Elop took over... but he destroyed any potential Nokia had left (think N9/MeeGo). And now he gutted the company even further and will take the devices unit with him as a rejoins the Microsoft family he was clearly so fond of. The poor must have really missed his family.
It's just incredible. I don't even blame Microsoft that much. What the hell was the Nokia board thinking? "Oh, this guy has run our company to the ground, he seems ok! Let's give him a few more years as CEO."
Sure. Currently, only Apple and Samsung are making money in this market. Google plans to join them. And now Microsoft is moi ing the party. This wouldn't be the first time that MS has come from behind: Word utterly crushed Word Perfect to become the standard in the early 90s, Excel pushed Lotus 1-2-3 into has-been status, Internet Explorer killed Netscape as a viable company, and people were surprised when MS released the Xbox and went on to make a fortune in the console industry. Now, they're trailing in the mobile market. They have $68 billion in the bank, a solid hardware manufacturer in their back pocket. Next up? My guess is that they'll take a page out of Google's Nexus playbook (ugh, bad pun) and release surprisingly solid mid-range handsets at very good prices until things stick.
What's incredible is that I haven't seen any mention of the shareholders or board of directors attempting to sue Elop's ass off for malfeasance.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
No. What we need is not more Android but more choice. Nokia has been the only ones that has been serious about Windows 8 Phone Series for Handsets Professional Touch Edition 2013. In a world where everyone is moving toward Android we need something to balance that, and that's where Microsoft + Nokia makes sense. We should not live in a world where Google is the only choice.
If you want "more choice", Nokia had that before. It was called MeeGo, and Elop killed it.
Circumcision is child abuse.
Given that Microsoft all but ensured that it would be an acquisition, Elop was the person who burnt the platform.
Shame that they took over Nokia and bastardized it to be an unremarkable Windows Phone platform.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Or the LG deal (2009). Or the Motorola deal (2003). Or the Nortel deal. Or the Verizon deal. Or the Ericsson deal. Or the Sendo deal.
Hmm. Of course most of those victories were achieved at least in part by leveraging MS' control of the underlying operating system. Admittedly the Xbox didn't have that advantage. That said, while the platform is certainly making money, it's still not clear that MS have recouped the massive investment they needed to brute force their way into the market.
This situation is different again. MS aren't competing against Apple, Google and Samsung. They're competing against Apple and Android. Every hardware manufacturer in the far east is eyeing Android and thinking "we could sell our phones under our own brand". So all the hardware guys that usually support are potential competitors. That's on top of Apple, Google and Samsung.
Even worse, they're pretty much tied to the windows brand for whatever phone they use. So the symbol that everyone sees when they're bored at school in computer class and the one that everyone sees when they're bored at work and wishing they were elsewhere doing something, anything else ... that's going to be the brand on the phone. All the Nokia ads I say downplayed the Windows brand as far as possible, which I think was clever of them. But I don't think MS' corporate pride will allow that.
What might save them in this market is big business. If they can get some large corporations to declare themselves as winphone shops and make everyone use the platform for all work related activities they could use that to make inroads into education and home use. But the business dudes all have iPhones or Android already and it works for them. It's going to be hard work getting them to give up those machines for windows. Especially with BYOD as an emerging trend.
If you ask me, their best hope might be to launch an Xbox phone. Xbox users tend to like the platform; load it up with plenty of free mobile games and they could build a user base pretty quickly, to say nothing of finally finding takers for their app store. But that wouldn't get them a "serious" offering so I don't think they'll do it.
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
Depressing Inevitability
This was the only likely scenario once Elop tied Nokia to the MS mast and cut away the lifeboats. It was always going to be we sail together and we sink together.
In many ways Nokia has fulfilled their side of the bargain by generating some hardware which is as good as any phone out there. What has held them back is the OS, which despite having some good features is always lagging behind the iphone and android, and seems incapable of introducing the needed changes at the rate required in a consumer device.
In a perfect world, Nokia would take over responsibility of the MS mobile division and it would be left alone to force the changes that the engineers of Nokia know are required. However what is more likely is that Microsoft will smother the innovative culture in Nokia to make it more like itself, so that we will get a company more concerned about how Office runs on the phone than offering the best consumer experience. I also can't wait to see how the trolls of Helsinki react to their first stack ranking session.
What is confusing about this is the timing. Is this Ballmer's last hurrah or Elop's last desperate grab for power. If your CEO had just announced he would be leaving so would not be taking long term responsibility for such a decision, as a board wouldn't you say Whoa, maybe we will get the next guy in to look at this? Lets face it with Baller's acquisition track record it may be more profitable to take the billions of dollars, pile it the middle of Oulu and set fire to it....
Choose your allies carefully, it is highly unlikely you will be held accountable for the actions of your enemies
Yes, I'm familiar with The Legend of Spectacular N9 Sales.
Spectacular reviews, and terrible sales because Elop sabotaged it.
Circumcision is child abuse.
I know some people that have (or had) a N9. Everybody, including non-geeks, says it's the best phone ever. It's ok if you don't believe me, go check the reviews.
And, hey, It was launched even before the Windows Phone 7.5 (which actually "late, buggy"). Microsoft only made a competitive OS with WP 8, 2 years after the Meego was ALREADY in the market.
I really don't understand how so many people buys the official MS-NOKIA-ELOP version of the history, where everything points the contrary.
Yep but Microsoft products certainly is not it. I would rather and Open Source platform dominate than ANY proprietary platform.