‘No Nokia, Microsoft Merger For Now,’ Nokia CEO

Stephen Elop, Nokia CEO

By ROMMY IMAH

Chief Executive Officer of mobile phone giants, Nokia, Stephen Elop has ruled out any possibility of a merger of Microsoft and the world’s leading mobile phone manufacturer at least for now.

Elop made this disclosure recently in Dubai during an interactive session with the media drawn across the Middle East and Africa.

A statement signed by Osagie Ogunbor, Head of Communications, West Africa noted that following the reported partnership deal between Nokia and Microsoft which will see Nokia adopting windows as its primary platform for all its smartphones, speculation has been rife that the deal was only a prelude to one of the parties acquiring the other. The Nokia chief executive was quick to dispel such speculations as unfounded.

The statement quoted Elop as saying that the adoption of windows as the platform for Nokia’s smartphone strategy was a mutually beneficial relationship between Nokia and Microsoft. He maintained that the issue of merger or acquisition was never tabled for consideration by either of the parties.

Elop also disclosed that Nokia was working round the clock to ensure that the first Nokia smartphone hits the market in the very near future.

Though Nokia is adopting windows as its smartphone strategy, the lower end devices for which it is still a market leader will continue to be built on the symbian platform.

There are over 200 million users of symbian phones the world over and Stephen Elop says Nokia is not about to ignore this segment of the market. He said Nokia’s huge market share in mobile phones is a good business case for mobile application developers to continue building innovative apps on symbian platform.

The Nokia Chief Executive praised the significant role the Middle East and Africa market plays in the overall success story of Nokia. He promised that Nokia would reward such disproportionate achievements with disproportionate investments. He was however, not specific whether such investments would be in the form of the siting of a manufacturing plant in the region.

Nokia is the world’s number one manufacturer of mobile devices by market share. Beyond its leadership status as a manufacturer of devices, Nokia is fast becoming a leading solutions provider in the converging Internet and communications industries providing Internet services that enable users to experience media, messaging, maps and games. Nokia’s partnership with Microsoft, which will lead to the emergence of Nokia windows smartphones aims at connecting the first one billion people to the Internet through the Nokia platform.