Nokia, a leading smartphone company, plans to cut its workforce by 10,000 by the end of 2013 in hopes of cutting costs and returning the company to its former position. Nokia representatives announced this at a press conference on Thursday. The company has already begun negotiations with employees who will be fired in accordance with local legislation.
Nokia CEO Stephen Elop said:
Nokia also plans to close R&D centers in Barnaby (Canada), Ulm (Germany) and Salo (Finland). The Finnish manufacturer plans to redefine priorities in a key market, optimize its IT functions, and corporate governance.
Nokia also provided investors with an updated forecast for the current quarter. According to the company, the "Smart Devices" project had a negative impact "to a slightly greater extent than previously expected."
Nokia also noted that they do not expect operational improvements in the next quarter. The expected profits planned for the second quarter of 2012 may be 3 percent lower than the previous forecast.
Over the past quarter, shipments of Symbian OS devices fell 60% compared to shipments a year ago. Moving away from Symbian, Nokia is switching to the Windows Phone platform, which powers the new flagship Lumia 900. But while Symbian shipments collapsed over the same period, Windows Phone shipments grew by 26.9%, but WP's share the total market decreased from 2.6% in the first quarter of 2011 to 2.2% in the same period in 2012.
And while Nokia lost about $ 1.7 billion in mobile device sales last quarter, it managed to raise $ 600 million in patent licensing disputes with Apple. This means that Nokia's litigation program for the last quarter generated more revenue from Apple than from its Windows Phone 7-based flagship Lumia.
