Analyst: "Microsoft will fail with Nokia handsets"

[a5cent]

Let's see, I'm trying to figure out if this is condemnation or a compliment!

I guess one could argue that being better than Tomi isn't saying much, but it was meant as a compliment... and as an answer to your question which implied that forum posters weren't any better. ;-)

Sorry if that wasn't clear.

 

[WanderingTraveler]

When I saw the URL, I decided not to jump. Why?

It's Tomi Ahonen. I know better than to trust him. Though, his claims have been right in the past .

 

[Long Syntax]

Let me see if I can sum Tomi Ahonen's arguments up for those who say tl;dr...

• Microsoft is Evil, I hate Microsoft - they suck - did I say Microsoft is evil?
• Elop is a jerk, he also sucks.
• Microsoft loves Apple and Microsoft wants to be just like them but can't becasue they are incompetent - and did I say Evil?
• Carriers Are Evil but Microsoft is more Evil - so I still hate Microsoft more.
• I hate Windows Phone - it sucks.

So lets see, did I get that about right?

This guy is a tool on a rant - I wish I had the half hour of my life (that I spent reading this) back.

 

[Angry_Mushroom]

"Osbourne effect, Ratner Effect, Elop Effect, Burning Platform effect..." I think this guy has a lot of effects and made up terms... It's an editorial, and for the time being the industry has reacted either neutrally or positively to this. I personally think it will be time sooner than later to retire the Nokia Lumia name. If MS wants to dedicate itself to the Windows Phone platform it needs to do so with a unique, and house sourced project. They did well by buying the house. They have a solid base of engineering and quality at their disposal now. If they play their cards rights WP8 will indeed take up that area between Apple and Google. Looking forward to the future. I won't leave Windows Phone just because someone got bought out.

TL;DR: Microsoft now has the perfect means to make the ultimate Windows Phone device.

 

[hary536]

He was not a Nokia employee that lost job after Elop came in.
And there is a valid argument if not correct. He is right that Elop and MS have said that carriers were reluctant in adopting skype.
That may also be the reason why Skype is still not integrated in WP. Also if you don't remember, when Nokia was selling Symbian phones,
skype app was available on Nokia's Ovi store and Nokia wanted to bundle it pre-loaded on their symbian phone that they wanted to sell on Verizon.
Verizon had not allowed Nokia to pre-load it or show any direct link to download skype. People had to search for the app in the store to download it.

I have seen Nokia's Symbian and WP days and there are some valid arguments in that post. I may not agree with all, but doesn't mean they are wrong or invalid.

The same issue was with Nokia maps since they are full offline. If you look at 1020 announcement, Elop made a joke about it indicating that AT&T was not
happy with full offline maps.(Since they want you to use more data).

Btw, Skype works on wi-fi too, not just data.

My impressions, just touching on a few things...... First, as others have said, obviously a former Nokia employee with a grudge. Lost his job due to "Elop'pian" cuts, maybe? The biggest thing I see here is that anytime someone is so full of themselves ("I was the first", "I was most accurate"), I have a hard time giving any credibility to anything else they say, since they've obviously started out with lies.

Here are some quotes that I really like </sarcasm>


Really, I don't see Skype as a problem for carriers. I mean, aren't plans shifting to data plans? I mean I shifted plans from a family plan with unlimited data and 1400 minutes to a family plan with unlimited minutes and limited data. I know I'm not the only situation, but it seems to me that more and more, it's data they're selling, not talk. I mean, can you even talk on a phone anymore? Does Skype work without some sort of data connection? I'll have to do some testing to try that out.......

He says a lot of things that sound like they could make sense, unless you know more than what he's saying. He's not telling you that it was AFTER MS bought Skype that Verizon came out and said they were going to push Windows Phone (and they have). He's leading you to believe that Windows Phone is bloated when in actuality it requires far less computing power than Android.

He's just a sore ex-employee on a rant. Nothing to see here - move along.

 

[WPmunkey]

He was not a Nokia employee that lost job after Elop came in.
And there is a valid argument if not correct. He is right that Elop and MS have said that carriers were reluctant in adopting skype.
That may also be the reason why Skype is still not integrated in WP. Also if you don't remember, when Nokia was selling Symbian phones,
skype app was available on Nokia's Ovi store and Nokia wanted to bundle it pre-loaded on their symbian phone that they wanted to sell on Verizon.
Verizon had not allowed Nokia to pre-load it or show any direct link to download skype. People had to search for the app in the store to download it.

I have seen Nokia's Symbian and WP days and there are some valid arguments in that post. I may not agree with all, but doesn't mean they are wrong or invalid.

The same issue was with Nokia maps since they are full offline. If you look at 1020 announcement, Elop made a joke about it indicating that AT&T was not
happy with full offline maps.(Since they want you to use more data).

Btw, Skype works on wi-fi too, not just data.

So you are saying MS/Nokia will fail because the carriers want more money. I agree. Couple that with Googs and Apples giving pressure on the other end and it's an uphill battle. MS needs more leverage to use against the carriers. That means more sales. Rock - (MS) - Hard place.

 

[spaulagain]

So you are saying MS/Nokia will fail because the carriers want more money. I agree. Couple that with Googs and Apples giving pressure on the other end and it's an uphill battle. MS needs more leverage to use against the carriers. That means more sales. Rock - (MS) - Hard place.

While true, I feel this is mostly a US issue. Around the world WP seems to be growing quite well and quickly. If WP gains a significant global market share (15%+) then US carriers will eventually be subject to that demand growing in the states as well. Microsoft is a powerhouse, they'll make it work even if the US carriers are kicking and screaming the whole way there.

 

[JustToClarify]

you all jump to ad hominem arguments, while it is true that he is full of grudge and he hates elop(for a reason, mind you) that doesn't automatically mean that he is wrong

he was right about majority of things starting from day 1 when elop came into office...and especially from day when he announced a "brilliant" burning memo, which is probably the most idiotic move any CEO has ever done

 

[ChMar]

Google is potentially more dangerous to the carriers than MS. It's true that MS has Skype but google has google voice and around 70% smartphone market share with android. And android can run Skype too. So to say now that carriers have a grudge agains MS but will support an even more potential dangerous google is completely crazy. What about SIP dialers??? They work on all platforms? Where are more SIP dialers on the Android platform or on another 3rd running platform. BB had for years their BB data plan separate of the carrier control and still the carriers were pushing BB devices. What is more logical a conspiracy theory based on nothing between all carriers or a simple customer study case that shows more interest for buying iphone and android devices than windows phone devices? Because as a carrier it makes more sense to buy more iphone and Samsung devices at discount than blocking their money on a platform with less demand. Carriers in Russia renounced on the iphone because they had disagreements with apple and this blog post states that Skype and by conjecture MS is banned by carriers just because of a grudge .

Nokia has the largest wp presence because they offered the largest collection of phones to choose from and targeted all range of prices and hw features and also because they invested in marketing. Samsung comes second because they made made the popular S3 phone a wp 8 phone and because they made another handset in less than 1 year interval even if they did not invest in marketing for obvious reasons. HTC did a fire and forget strategy launching a high-end and low end devices and with no marketing support or any other device launched since the beginning. In the start Microsoft branded the 8x as the reference device for windows phone so it's not like they did not want to support all the manufacturers. The huawey made 2 devices but of course no one was paying attention to them in the press because well they are a Chinese company, they did not have the htc "feature device" in the begging, they are not the big name Samsung and they did not made enough effort in marketing campaigns as nokia.

I don't see why MS will fail buy buying Nokia. I don't believe in a conspiracy of the carriers world wide because of Skype. Now MS makes devices so there is a certainty that windows phone will exist. And as professional developer pool you have a MS way of doing things that spans from servers and cloud to desktop and tablets and phone using mostly the same technologies (.NET, COM, XAML based stacks). Of all the tech companies they offer the biggest area of grow for third party OEMs or 3rd party software companies in all areas. Saying that an airline is going full windows ecosystem is nothing and we are talking only about a couple thousand devices is downgrading the importance of the enterprise potential of the platform.

 

[OzRob]

Citation or FUD?

umm....look at the stickie poll on this forum. That's where the figure comes from.

And my original post was simply pointing out the irony of someone using battery drain as an example of Android's failings when there's a poll running on this very forum on that very issue with WP8. I guess people don't own many black pots or kettles these days!

 

[iamtim]

umm....look at the stickie poll on this forum. That's where the figure comes from.

Yeah, the one I linked up above. The one which still has less than 100 respondents.

 

[MacDaMachine]

If Microsoft can use its money stacks to actually produce tons of phones then we should be good.

Just imagine if Nokia had enough money to have produce enough Lumia 920s to not have an exclusive deal with ATT. It could have been on ATT and Verizon without hold backs and exclusivity deal.

 

[Lumia 8x]

There are a lot of uncomfortable truths in that blog post that will be ignored here. Lets be honest, WP would already be dead if not for the Lumia series. WP enjoys little to no carrier support. The only region it has done relatively well is Europe, thanks to Nokia's carrier relations and customer reputation there. Now that Nokia is gone, WP is going to face more difficulty getting to consumers, not less. And it will make no difference even if the next Lumias are the best phones ever. I'm a huge Nokia Lumia fan, but it makes me sick what Elop and MS did to Nokia and its employees (there are going to be thousands of layoffs - and notice who will stay - sales (ie carrier relations) and manufacturing). You have to be willfully blind to think Elop didn't kill the N9 and release the burning platform memo by mistake because he's just that stupid. It was sabotage.

Just wtf are you talking about? No one is getting fired. They are al transferring over the Microsoft

 

[hary536]

If Microsoft can use its money stacks to actually produce tons of phones then we should be good.

Just imagine if Nokia had enough money to have produce enough Lumia 920s to not have an exclusive deal with ATT. It could have been on ATT and Verizon without hold backs and exclusivity deal.

It was not about Nokia not having money. It was about demand. If they knew they would need X number of Lumias, they would have built that. They just couldn't afford to build in advance and then write-down millions like MS did for Surface RT. They were smarter than MS.

 

[Jazmac]

TL;DR. Just another windbag blogger pundit.

I really have to question cereal killer's motivations in finding this article and posting it here. 3300 global posts? 13 posts here? A Droid in your profile? Not looking to spread FUD, now, are you?

I do notice that somehow these tales of woe always find their way onto the forum almost always by those with less than 10 posts and almost always by someone who have recently become dishearten by Windows Phone.

 

[a5cent]

So to say now that carriers have a grudge agains MS but will support an even more potential dangerous google is completely crazy.

I work for a carrier and I can assure you this is not as crazy as it sounds. He is right on this one.

Distributing Android devices doesn't require carriers to maintain a business relationship with Google. Carriers order their devices from OEMs that can add/remove/alter almost any part of the Android OS. There are a few things OEMs and carriers can't touch, but these aren't features/apps carriers care about. Basically, all of Android is setup to be the carriers biatch, which they of course appreciate.

With WP things are different. MS doesn't allow OEMs or carriers to alter anything related to the OS. MS does coordinate their efforts to ensure they aren't doing anything carriers would disapprove of, but both technical and legal barriers stand in the way of carriers willy nilly doing away with whatever displeases them. As a carrier you engage in a business relationship with both MS and the OEM. Despite carriers being in a position to strong arm MS into virtually anything, the legal ramifications make the situation more complicated and leave the carriers with less freedoms. Carriers can't do whatever they choose. Add Skype to that picture, and yeah, things get much worse.

At some point, enough people will have to walk into carrier stores and demand a WP device. Enough so that carriers can't ignore WP without hurting their bottom line to an unacceptable degree. Microsoft has no choice but to rely on consumers to drive demand for WP. Tomi is right that WP will fail if MS can't get that done.

 

[rianext]

What a depressing article....:|

 

[a5cent]

What a depressing article....:|

Look at it this way. This guy has been ranting about Nokia and MS for years. Were things only half as bad as he previously described them, then Nokia would have gone bankrupt early last year and nowhere in the world would WP have more than 2% market share.

He gets many little details right, but he consistently fails when it comes to correctly assessing the big picture.

MS isn't doing as well in mobile as they should, but the situation isn't nearly as hopeless as this guy makes it out to be.

 

[mgkeath]

I'm tired of the Kin bashing. My goodness, Microsoft has other failures besides Kin. My goodness Windows mobile/phone 6.1, 6.5,6.5.X, MSN smart watches etc...

I read kin and I scream please stop it!

Also, the Kin was some dumb, little, niche phone built for early teens. The way people concentrate on it, you'd think it was Microsoft's vision for their mobile future. It's amazing just how ignorant the tech world can be of such an unimportant product that was never supposed to turn into a whole ecosystem.

 

[a5cent]

which doesn't change the fact that his predictions came true, it might be FUD if he was talking something without any facts or missing predictions badly but he was so damn right about everything about Nokia-MS relationship that it can't be called FUD anymore, he knows the stuff

BS. I would suggest you go back and look at his previous writings. Not half of it came true.