Finnish giants encounter an unprecedented crisis

Once upon a time, Saipan represented a period of mobile communication tools. At a time when Nokia was the "crown pearl" of US investors, however, the world is not always the same. The Finnish giant is facing an unprecedented crisis.

Nokia is a multinational mobile communications company headquartered in Finland. In the mobile phone product market, Nokia has occupied the first place in market share for many years. Since 2003, Nokia has accounted for more than 30% of the global mobile phone market, and even reached nearly 40% during its peak period. In the third quarter of 2009, Nokia had its first loss since 1996, with a loss of 559 million euros. With the arrival of the loss, Iphone-led smartphones are under tremendous pressure. Nokia urgently needs to introduce compelling smartphone products to reverse the trend of declining handset prices. The company hopes that the new N8 will help the company turn around. Unfortunately, industry experts believe that this phone is a similar product to its predecessor and cannot lead the trend.

In fact, Nokia had faced a crisis earlier in the year. Around 2005, Japanese and Korean multimedia phones relied on QVGA resolution 260,000 color screens, more than 2 million high-quality cameras, MP3, video capabilities, Nokia's 4096-color, low-resolution, toy camera products look like outdated Dinosaurs. At that time, Nokia responded in a timely manner, the screen could not improve the resolution, the camera could not help Carl Zeiss, plus the advantages of its Saipan system relative to the Japanese and Korean non-intelligent systems, passed the crisis safely. Many models of the N series became the king of sales. Even today, the N95 and N81 are still popular models in the secondary market.

This crisis is different from before. The decline of Nokia actually has nothing to do with IPHONE. A vendor with a single hardware and software and a single product has done a better job. The impact is limited to the same price market. Nokia has only a partial impact on the overall layout of Nokia. Just lost a high-end market. The real deadly thing is Android. Prior to IPHONE, Nokia's products covered the entire market from 50 to 700 US dollars, IPHONE appeared, the market above 500 US dollars was severely impacted, and low-end and mid-tier Nokia still had absolute advantages, and the emergence of Android changed everything. Once HTC's Android was created, the market above 300 US dollars was hit, and even more frightening was Android's open policy.

Rockchip and MTK these low-end solutions providers, so that the market appeared $ 150 Android phone, although it is not easy to use, after all, it has emerged. Qualcomm offers mid-range solutions ranging from $200 to $250. Samsung, NVIDIA, and TI can offer high-end solutions ranging from $300 to $700.

More than the program is not enough, the increase in manufacturers more let Nokia headache, the bottom there is a cottage, a little higher in China's ZTE Huawei, Saipan's lineup in the previous Samsung, Sony Ericsson have betrayed, as well as the old rival HTC. The market space left for Saipan and Nokia is too small. Non-smart phones, cottages using MTK and Spreadtrum solutions and China's low-end manufacturers have basically locked up Nokia's space. Nobody can do this, and Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG and moto cannot compete in this market. Nokia Naturally not. APPLE cracks down on high-end, Android strikes mid-to-high end and mid-range, invades low-end, and cottages lock in the low end. This is the crisis situation Nokia faces today.

So what caused Nokia to lose its throne? Michael Schlager, deputy director of the eMarkets agency at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology media lab, believes that Nokia ignores this special presence in the United States. This company did not actively, cleverly and humbly compete in the US market. It did not consider the needs of the US market when it was innovative. Nokia's idea is to ensure its own commanding height in the European market and lead the Asian market. It can be said that in the eyes of this Finnish giant, the importance of the richest country in the world was ranked third.

In less than five years, Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android turned out to announce Nokia’s major misstep: If the US market is a loser, you cannot be a true global innovator. And look at the following figures: From 2009 to 2010, the global market share of Nokia smartphones has dropped from about 47% to about 38%. Nokia’s sales figures in North America are even more jaw-dropping: It slipped from less than 3.5% of the market to less than 3%. Nokia is insignificant in the US smart phone market. This part of the business only accounts for 7% of Nokia's total smartphone sales. Nokia has not built a good innovation platform in the United States.

Today, the iPhone’s global market share has climbed to 16%, and Android’s global smartphone share has soared from 4% in 2009 to nearly 23% in 2010. In the United States, their market share is 24% and 39%, respectively. Both of Nokia’s most powerful competitors have accounted for almost ten times its market share in the United States.

Although China, India, and Latin America are undoubtedly huge potential markets, any company that disregards the United States, the world’s richest country, and its consumers and innovators must be in danger. Whether there is no will or no ability, Nokia's inaction in the US market has already made this brand that once led the technology and market trends no longer ignorant. The price to ignore the US market is to watch the two most threatening competitors quickly. Land, safely and skillfully catch up with themselves.

In order to save the backward situation, Nokia painstakingly launched a full-scale counterattack: to cut down the prices of its mobile phones to prevent Samsung and Sony Ericsson from attacking; to cooperate with Microsoft and use Microsoft's office software to challenge RIM (BlackBerry); within 7 months The two reorganizations set boundaries for smart phone business and traditional mobile phone business. They intend to increase their combat effectiveness in the field of smart phones. After seeing the huge development potential of mobile internet, Nokia began to make heavy fists to enter the mobile Internet market: Intel, the processor leader, has jointly launched the open MeeGo platform; launched "music with music" service in the Chinese market; used "free music" as a vanguard; China's mobile Internet market; launched a mobile free navigation service and globally The walking and driving navigation on mobile phones will all be free. At the same time, on October 22nd, 2009, Nokia filed a lawsuit in the federal court of Delaware, the United States. The company stated that since the iPhone was launched in 2007, all models of the iPhone manufactured by Apple have been manufactured. All mobile phones infringe these patents. The main purpose of the lawsuit may be to delay the iPhone's hind legs, delay its growth rate, and get a breathing space for its own strategic adjustments.

As for the future of Nokia, the future cannot be predicted. We only wait and see.