For almost 30 years, Nokia has been a leader in the mobile phone market and has exclusively used its own internally developed software to power them. But now, that’s changing.
Nokia’s presence in the developed parts of the world has declined severely over the last few years. That’s because it doesn’t have the iPhone and it doesn’t do Android. Nokia has its own mobile operating system, Symbian, and has staunchly refused to put any other platform on any of its phones.
In fact, in a different life, Nokia actually sold licenses of Symbian to other manufacturers. That revenue stream is almost completely dried up now. So Nokia is finally looking to drastic measures to remain relevant in the market.
Tech blogger Eldar Murtazin has reported that Nokia initiated discussions with Microsoft to bring the new Windows Phone 7 operating system to future Nokia handsets. Nokia’s recently appointed CEO was formerly a Microsoft exec.
The partnership could help both companies out, as Microsoft is also struggling in the mobile world. Windows Phone 7 has sold just a few tens of thousands units since it launched a few weeks ago.
Incidentally, Nokia does still have the highest market share in the global mobile market, but that’s because of the millions of inexpensive phones it sells to third-party countries around the world. It has a monopolistic command there. But in the more important areas, it’s almost nonexistent these days. [[Nokia]]
