MeeGo smartphones and tablet devices will offer overwhelmingly superior experiences and applications than iOS and Android based competitor products
That is one bold statement. I don't know if I'd bet the company's success on a claim like that.
That is one bold statement. I don't know if I'd bet the company's success on a claim like that.
Phones need strong app ecosystems and familiar apps that everyone expects, but developers can only realistically support so many discrete platforms.
Nokia is great at making hardware, they should be confident that is what will stop them being a commodity OEM should they support a first-class citizen operating system (which is iOS or Android - so assuming no deal to support iOS means for me they have to do Android)
Phones need strong app ecosystems and familiar
apps that everyone expects
MeeGo is based on the Linux ecosystem. Porting games from Android / iOS to MeeGo should be trivial. Building cross-platform apps that run on all of them in C++ is also doable, since you can share the business-logic.
Android would be a bad choice for them. They are big enough to want to differentiate themselves from the competition. Forking Android would be terrible for everybody; Symbian all over again.
So MeeGo or a new version of Symbian is their best option: they can reuse existing code-bases and they also have enough control.
Either way, the partnership with Microsoft is a disaster.
Building cross-platform apps that run on all of them in C++ is also doable, since you can share the business-logic.
Otherwise your best options are Webview components + HTML + Javascript + some native hooks to provide the missing functionality. Works quite well, take a look at PhoneGap + JQuery mobile / jQTouch.
But I could do without all of them, all I need is an Email client + a browser + a Skype client.
If you build a usable/reliable OS with a usable browser and email client, people will buy your phone and devs will come.
WP7 is not even on the radar yet for developers. Porting apps to WP7 for me is waisted effort instead of improving the code-bases for Android / iOS (which also have shared logic that I cannot port easily to WP7 because WP7 doesn't allow native code).
As for the native code argument, well I don't entirely buy that. Developing for WP7 is easy and accessible enough - as evidenced by the flood of apps the platform has already.
There is a world of difference between getting an <strikeout>executable program application</strikeout> app to run and designing one from the ground up that is platform specific and provides an optimal UX.
And when speaking about "games", they have their own UI, so providing an optimal UX is not about using OS-specific widgets.
This whole "Plan B" is big on nice-sounding words that don't stand up to a serious critical analysis. Here's the first point, for instance -
> Return the company to a strategy that seeks high growth and high profit margins through innovation and overwhelmingly superior products with unrivaled user experience.
1. High growth strategy (lower price, more market share, more sales) tends to be antagonistic with high profit margins (high price, lower market share, less sales).
2. "innovation and overwhelmingly superior products with unrivaled user experience" - They're going up against Apple, who are already doing an overwhelmingly superior job and producing an unrivaled user experience... and Apple has a 5-10 year head start. How do they plan to make that gap up while charging high prices (for high margins), and getting large market share?
...the whole site seems more based on arousing emotion than critical thinking/planning.
Maintain ownership and control of the software layer of the Nokia products. Software is where innovation, differentiation and shareholder value can most easily be created.
This IMHO is undeniable.
Maybe MeeGo would be great but that's certainly unclear at this point. They had years to come out with compelling software and they did not deliver. Essentially these guys are asking for more time.
At this point the steamroller that is Android is up to speed. I don't see how MeeGo is going to make inroads anymore unless it is drastically better. Even though WP7 is actually shipping, it has a similar problem. IMHO, it has to be quite a bit better than Android in order to gain much market share.
Nokia 6310, featuring similar software, also dominated the market for business phones for a long time. Even when phones with color screens started to sell, people would still buy Nokia 6310 because it was reliable and easy to use.
Of course it is nothing compared to today's smartphones, but you're overestimating the talent and resources required to build good software, especially when they've got all the resources and talent they need.
Their problem is not that they can't write software. Their problem is the lack of focus, and this latest partnership only makes matters worse.
From what I can tell they are cancelling all their different software efforts and focusing on making great hardware to go with Microsofts operating system. What makes you think this is making their lack of focus worse? Sounds to me like it's a step in the right direction? If they were adding WP7 to their current offerings I'd agree but I thought they weren't doing that?
A software on 3310/6310 was much simpler than what we have today. It was hard to write because of the hardware requirements, but it was simple in design.
it was simple in design
I think this is just the same old Nokia thinking - underestimating the difficulty of creating top notch software.
Are you saying that the software is the place it's the easiest to create a competitive advantage? (I understand that shareholder value equals to competitive advantage)
This statement is logically wrong - if it's easy for everybody to create a competitive advantage, then it's easy for nobody.
Or did you mean "It's software where Nokia can gain a competitive advantage against the competition". If so, then you should explain what is so special about Nokia.. Because from what we've seen so far this company proved anything but that it can do software well.
Or didn't mean a competitive advantage, but just innovation and differentiation? (I think that most people that repeat this statement do think it). Well - it is indeed easy to innovate and differentiate in software (change the UI, add some bells and whistles). But does it lead to the competitive advantage and shareholder value? There are plenty of examples to show that it doesn't (Symbian, BeOS to name a few).
So: no. Just because Apple uses software to gain shareholder value doesn't mean that it's just as good an idea for other hardware producers.
Getting into margins now is job of WP7 platform. Symbian is not fit into smartphone field (use S^3 if you don't believe) and these guys realise it. True that Meego will need lot of work, but there should be enough time to polish it before market they should be targing opens.
>Apple for one is known to be looking way ahead of "current market".
So was Nokia. So was Microsoft. It is easy get stuck into profitable segment and not to expand in fear of losses.