“Ok. Now its pretty well established in several news sources, that Nokia tried to get Microsoft to buy the company last year, but Microsoft decided against it,” Tomi Ahonen writes for Communities Dominate Brands. “That gives fresh insights and ‘clues’ to what might have been driving Elop to such unprecedented madness from this infamous Burning Platforms memo – the costliest management memo of all time – to the ludicrious decisions about announcing the end of Symbian with no Windows Phone smartphones even to show, far less to sell; to the infuriating decisions to not support Nokia’s own-developed and truly excellent products from the N9 on MeeGo to 808 Pureview on Symbian, to not even releasing the N950 on MeeGo to the baffling decision on suddeinly terminating Meltemi mere weeks before phones were ready to be shown.”
“Elop is the worst CEO of all time,” Ahonen writes, “he has personally caused the biggest corporate downfall in the Global Fortune 500 history, after we eliminate management fraud and crimes. For management incompetence Elop is the benchmark. The worst CEO ever. We need not review all his damage, growing smartphone sales turned into history’s fastest collapse. Growing profitable handset business turned into fastest losses ever in this industry. Market share collapse – Nokia was twice as large in market share as the iPhone, four times as big as Samsung’s smartphones when Elop started – and grew more in 2010 than either rival – but now Nokia smartphones (on all of its platforms, combined) is one sixth the size of the iPhone and one tenth the size of Samsung’s smartphones. Nokia share price, Nokia brand value, Nokia loyalty, all destroyed in the past 2 years and four months.”
“I don’t mean that Nokia was ‘in great shape’ before Elop – I never said that, I was warning that Nokia had problems at the time – but Nokia was growing strongly, making strong – growing – profits, and towered over its rivals before the Elop Effect in February 2011. After Elop started to massacre the businesses of Nokia, its been sheer carnage,” Ahonen writes. “Now. Could there be a reason to the madness? What if we don’t examine this from the prism – what is best for Nokia and its shareholders. If we examine it from this angle ‘Elop promised to sell Nokia to Microsoft.'”
Read more in the full article – recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: Prior to being named Nokia CEO in September 2010, Stephen Elop worked for Microsoft as the head of its Business Division from January 2008 to September 2010. At the time of his retirement, Elop was Microsoft’s eighth largest shareholder.
It’s not too farfetched to think that, initially, Ballmer and this frog-faced twonk Elop cooked up some big “top-secret plan” and that, not long after it went into effect, even Ballmer T. Clown was smart enough to recognize that Nokia and its Windows Phone-based “business” wasn’t worth a plugged nickel.
As we’ve written previously, it’s “Elop, with a capital ‘F.'”
Related articles:
Beleaguered Nokia CEO Stephen Elop throws ‘embarrassing’ Apple iPhone across floor (with video) – March 22, 2013
Apple iPhone thrashing Microsoft’s beleaguered Nokia 10-to-1, casting pall over U.S. effort – January 25, 2013
Beleaguered Nokia axes 4,000 jobs; shifts production to Asia – February 8, 2012
The world’s worst CEO is NOT Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, it’s Nokia’s Stephen Elop – October 19, 2012
Microsoft’s beleaguered Nokia Lumia sales fall 28 percent, North American sales cut in half – October 18, 2012
Beleaguered Nokia to axe 20% of workforce, close only plant in Finland; stock crashes – June 14, 2012
Mossberg reviews Microsoft’s Nokia Lumia 900, can’t recommend it over superior iPhone 4S – April 5, 2012
Beleaguered Nokia axes another 3,500 people; trims manufacturing operations – September 29, 2011
Beleaguered Nokia to shed 7,000 employees – April 27, 2011
Beleaguered Nokia to axe up to 800 jobs in Finland – December 14, 2010
This stupidity is due to the Nokia-Microsoft contract where Nokia is allowed to make only Windows smartphones if they want to get the platform support. If they are going to start new projects after 11th February 2011 announcement, they have to pay back all platform support, manforce, advertising and everything else to Microsoft. It is billions, not millions, in cash.
For example the MeeGo project was started before the contract and in the Nokia-Intel contract stated that the developer and consumer phone must be released. This was done and said by the company that do not buy this crap until we get Windows Phones with similar specification.
Take over the company, run it into the ground and then Ms buy’s it up cheap, they would then be in the phone business big time.
But they did too good of a job and wasn’t worth buying.
How many people have lost their jobs? Finland’s pride and joy trashed.
Gates off galavanting like the second coming ( or the third, after Obama ) pretending to be a force for good.
http://nsnbc.me/2013/05/08/bill-gates-polio-vaccine-program-caused-47500-cases-of-paralysis-death/
You were on a roll until the Obama jab.
Why can’t you keep your political views out of tech discussions?
Obama is a bag of shit. If you can’t see it by now, you’re hopeless. If you vote, stop. You’re too stupid to handle it.
Wow, are you 10?
Not only are you adding to the previous commenter’s political insertions into tech threads but you are now making a personal attack on someone that happens to have a different opinion than you. Apparently, you are too narrow minded to feel that’s allowed. What shade of red is your neck?
Look, Johnny Boy, your political beliefs have NOTHING to do with the topic at hand. I don’t care if you’re Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Populist, Know-Nothing, or a freaking Tory. Shut up about politics. Talk about the subject matter in the article, or shut up.
A joke, chill.
We have experienced far too many political ‘jokes’ on MDN. They just detract from the Apple discussion and degenerate into childish tirades, generally with the puerile assistance of botvinnik and his cronies. Everyone should say no to political trash talk on this forum. It is worthless and irritating.
He did learn at the feet of the master, he just did not have a locked in group of corporate IT to fall back on.
Hopefully he’ll be Ballmer’s successor.
After Ballmer stays another 10 years first! LOL
Never put down to conspiracy what is better explained by incompetance.
Nokia, Blackberry need to learn form Samsung, meaning copy iPhone like Samsung did if they wanted to doing good in Smartphone market. 🙂
Samsung copied the best of the best to make billion dollars.
“growing smartphone sales turned into history’s fastest collapse.”
Growing??? Nokia was over the cliff well before Stephen Flop joined the company.
Jorma Ollila (ex CEO and un-visionary; the total opposite of Steve Jobs) had made sure of that. Flop then only carried on the company’s policy of not doing what they should to guard against the competition.
Nokia’s mistake had nothing to do with Apple, but with NOT building an Android phone and thus competing with Samsung, which they could have.
This has been Nokia’s legacy; not competing with the clam shell, not competing with the Razor (the list goes on and on), thus letting the competition gain market share.
Nokia’s own MeeToo and other ridiculous “smart” OS’s were ALL still born.
What cliff look at the numbers they where doing quite well. Are you a shill or just ignorant?
I think Elop is a Trojan Horse, he did that on purpose to kill off one of the biggest competitors. And the plan worked.
MDN is a fraud. They censor posts that aren’t favourable to them and still allow downloading of a totally crap 1* App.
Grow up guys!
Stop Nokia Lumia Music Player..
Watch solution at forllowing youtube video: