So Nokia just went public with a whole new direction without notifying their partner Intel. Whether or not Microsoft will use this opportunity as further grounds to undermine a valid Linux based competitor known as MeeGo remains to be seen. Nokia and Intel share intellectual property in that platform so it's debatable what may happen.
Hardware Issues:
Supposedly Nokia did try to bring to market some devices with MeeGo but there were issues with the hinge construction. So the phone companies turned them down. My personal view on this is why was Nokia still thinking hinges? Slider phones are a joke and the market leader, which is pretty much the iPhone, has no keyboard. Who's stupid idea was it to keep including something that has no market relevance? Slate/slab phones are basic and to the point, easy to construct.
Market Irrelevance:
Overall it's funny to think anybody cares what Nokia does here in the USA. Nokia has always chose to ignore the states in favor of the rest of the world. I thought this was commendable at first but they made all the wrong moves going forward. Not to mention, what good are expensive boutique stores marketing your products if nobody can really buy them?
Mistake of buying Symbian:
Purchasing Symbian wasted money and drew attention away from their other more credible assets. Nokia should have parted ways with Symbian a long time ago. Instead, like their CEO says, they poured gasoline on the fire and purchased the Symbian platform. Then they pretended to make it into an open-source Android rival. They should have focused on their Linux assets like Maemo (now known as MeeGo) and QT instead.
Missed Opportunities:
The Nokia Nx00 series could have beat Apple's iPhone to market but nobody (executive wise) had any foresight at Nokia to make it happen. They treated the Nx00 series like an experiment instead of refocusing their product teams around making it into an awesome phone platform. It took Apple a year or two to totally replicate the advantages of the Nokia Nx00 series (copy & paste, native App store, Flash, Skype) but they at least made an effort. Nokia could have done something but instead chose the worst path, Symbian. The aging Nokia Nx00 series is still the best product they've ever released and just to prove it here's Android running as an application.
Partner Example:
Sony Ericsson was involved a lot with the Symbian platform and look where they went. They sold out to Android because they probably felt like they got screwed over by Nokia when they took total control of the OS. Now Sony Ericsson is making phones with Android and PlayStation Portable integration included. Looks like they didn't see Android as giving up.
Relevant News:
- Symbian remembered by those who started it - Pocket-lint
