Silly Silly Forbes: No its not Nokia's "Motorola Moment".. Very poor reporting

This is very incompetent reporting by Forbes. They get essentially all facts wrong on which they base their analysis. Very silly Forbes, reporting this sloppy will hurt the reputation of your magazine.

Lets examine the evidence shall we.

Parmy Olson wrote an article entitled "Nokia's Motorola Moment" today on 17 July 2009. In the article Forbes suggests that the "global champion is lagging behind an innovation shift spearheaded by Apple and even Toshiba". As evidence the magazine says that there is a "big shift happening in the mobile sector, with consumers more interested in easy Web browsing and applications than the look and feel of their phone."

Then Forbes quotes a clearly clueless analyst Lee Simson of Jeffries and Co, saying "All these guys who have nothing to do with mobile are coming into this space with better handsets than Nokia"

Of the trend to mobile phone and PC convergence, Forbes quotes the same Simpson who claims that Nokia doesn't offer details.Then Forbes suggests Nokia is in a position similar to Motorola a few years ago, and Nokia now is "failing to catch on to other innovations that are taking place in the handset space"

Forbes says Nokia was late to clam-shell phones, late to touch-screens and late to the applications store. Then they again quote clueless Simpson saying "there is nothing innovative about Nokia"

Forbes concludes observing that there is a trend in the West to smartphones, and mentions the iPhone and RIM's Blackberry as devices that Forbes thinks are successfully capturing this smartphone opportunity.

WHAT DO YOU THINK, TOMI?

What a load of crap. Rarely have I read a major publication get essentially all of its points so totally wrong. What is wrong with Forbes editors and Parmy Olson to not do the simplest, most basic research into the facts. Lets go through them one by one.

Lagging in innovation (vs who? Apple?). Forbes claims clearly that Nokia is lagging in innovation compared to Apple's iPhone. Now, the current iPhone 3GS is yes, a very impressive smartphone. Lets look at a few of the innovations we witnessed in this newest model, one month ago? Compared with the iPhone 3G from a year ago, the "innovative" 3GS upgraded its camera to 3 megapixels. Nokia is clearly not as innovative, as Nokia's first 3 megapixel cameraphone (and yes, smartphone) was released in 2006. The 3GS now added video recording ability to the camera feature of its phone. When did Nokia's (smartphone) cameraphones all incorporate this "innovative" ability? in 2004. Apple now offers video recording at 30 frames per second at so-called DVD quality. First Nokia smartphone to have 30 fps DVD quality video recording came out in 2006. The 3GS added MMS picture messaging support in 2009. Nokia's cameraphones have all been MMS compliant at least since 2003 (proabably 2002, I don't remember exactly). Apple added Autofocus in 2009. Nokia had autofocus early in 2007

Note that these all are improvements to Apple's "innovative" phone, after two changes, where each of these features existed on Nokia smartphones before the original 2G iPhone had even been launched. Who is innovative, if it took Apple two tries to get these features included. Who is following whom?

What of the previous edition of the iPhone? How innovative was the iPhone 3G in June of 2008? It offered three signifcicant changes to the handset (I'll talk about Apps store later), ie it added 3G, GPS and it added TV-out. Again, how does this innovative phone maker compare with the "follower"? Nokia's first smartphones with 3G high-speed connectivity were released in 2003. GPS? The other hot innovative feature of iPhone 3G? Nokia had it in the N95 more than a year before the iPhone 3G, in fact before the original iPhone 2G. And TV-out? Nokia offered TV out from 2006.

I can appreciate the admiration for Apple, and that its phones are sexy and extremely user-friendly and yes, its touch screen technology was quite innovative (back in 2007) but what have you done for me lately, Apple? Essentially every improvemnt to the iPhone has been a copy of Nokia innovations from years earlier. Not months, years. Six years in the case of MMS... Who is the innovative phone maker?

BUT WAIT, IT GETS WORSE

Really incompetent reporting, shame on you Forbes. Lets go on, it gets worse.  

Big shift to web browsing. Yes, there is a big shift to web browsing. But Parmy Olson, Apple did not invent this shift. Apple did not cause this shift. Apple did not originate this shift. Apple did not expose this shift. At best, in those markets where the iPhone is popular (mostly in lagging mobile telecoms markets like the USA), it has helped move this shift along. In Japan for example, where previous iPhone models have been total duds in the market (only now, the 3GS is finally accepted in Japan as an acceptable phone for that market), the existing internet usage has already shifted to mobile phones, and its not just the majority of users who now access the "real" full internet on their phones, but also the bulk of internet surfing time is on mobile phones. And this had happened by 2006, long before an iPhone. So no, this is not an Apple innovation. But yes, Apple did bring a smartphone to the market, that could access the real unrestricted full internet. And yes, Apple offered this on its iPhone already back in 2007. That is our "innovative" company.

Now, when did Nokia learn to offer the full unrestricted (non-WAP) internet on a cellular phone? How long did it take for Nokia to learn to do this amazing innovation? Not in 2007, not in 2008, not in 2009. In 1997 - exactly 10 years BEFORE the iPhone, Nokia released its first (pre)smartphone, that had full internet access, and yes, a similar width VGA screen 640 pixels across the screen, as Apple has today. Now yes, back in 1997 the Nokia 9000 Communicator did have a monochrome (black-and-white) screen, but hey, if you want to acknowledge a "big shift to web browsing" and then accuse Nokia of being less innovative than Apple - Nokia did not only do this before Apple, Nokia was the world's first phone to offer this, and yes, that was a decade before Apple. Who is the innovator? When the original iPhone launched, Nokia had about a dozen smartphone models that all featured the full internet. Not with the touch screens, but if the point was that somehow Nokia is not innovative because it missed the "big shfit" to web browsing, this is patently wrong. Nokia INVENTED this shfit. I personally wrote the first white paper when I was employed at Nokia, in 1999, on how to do the internet on cellular phones. Don't tell me Nokia has not seen this shfit coming - and done massive amount of education over the past decade before the iPhone, to teach the industry how to do it.

You know what, Parmy Olson. I have this nagging feeling that I've actually read abou this somewhere, quite a while back. Hmmm. Oh yes, a Richard C Morris wrote about the "tech-jammed" Nokia Communicator and how it gave access to email in 2001, for a publication called Forbes.

By the way, that 640 pixels wide Apple iPhone screen is VGA resolution. Now the latest Nokia E90 Communciator (from early 2008) has SVGA resolution ie 800 pixels wide. Makes internet surfing far more comfortable than having columns weirdly re-formated on the screen like on any iPhone that formats to basic VGA. But maybe thats "not innovative", eh? Apple didn't bother to add to its screen resolution in three models. Nokia's E90 is also wider - 4 inches vs iPhone's 3.5 inches, but again, whose counting.

IT GETS WORSE

Big shfit to applications. Yes, there is a shfit to applications. There is a lot of disagreement in the industry whether this is truly a "big shift" as today the "data services" side of the mobile industry (excluding SMS text messaging) is 10 times bigger than total applications sales; and 250 times bigger than total revenues of the Apple Apps Store, and many industry leaders, just yesterday Google's CEO for example, have said data services will  be bigger than data applications. But lets accept this shift. Yes, there is a shift to data applications, and yes, there are many experts who claim this is a "big shift", so lets not squabble about that issue. You can fairly report that such a shift is indeed going on, even if perhaps there is an even bigger shift as well. So apps? So apparently Apple is the big innovator with this "shift".

Apple's Apps Store is one year old. Nokia also has an apps store, it is called Ovi. Ovi launched its applications store in May of 2009. So how severly behind the times is Nokia? Its apps store was launched ten months after Apple's. So while Apple is six years behind Nokia, Apple is still innovative, but when Nokia is that quick-moving that it releases a rival service in ten months, Nokia is "failing to catch on" to innovations.

Yes, really? Apple took 12 months to build a portfolio of about 55,000 applications in its store. In two months, Nokia is already at 20,000 applications. Oh, just to see how impressive that is, Google's Android has 5,000 apps, RIM's Blackberry 2,000 Apps and Windows Mobile 600 Apps. But in 2 months, Nokia is already at 20,000. Is this really a slow-mover who is failing to move and take market opportunities? Really, Parmy Olson? Did you not bother to do the most basic Google search of your topic before writing this drivel?

But lets really look at the facts, who was the innovator in this? Nokia released its Ovi branded mobile services store in August of 2007, almost a year before Apple's Apps Store. Ovi was right from the start announced to be Nokia's all-inclusive store to deliver and to sell mobile services, applications and content. Note this is significantly more than Apple's Apps store in its scope - more innovative - and announced a year before the Apple "innovation". That Nokia did not rush apps to its store reflected its market presense and understanding of its customers - Ovi launched first in Europe and Asia - and it delivered such content and services as maps, screen savers, photos, music etc. And if you bothered to read that quarterly report from Nokia, you'd have seen that Nokia's "services business" (apps, services and content) earns to Nokia royalties in 2009 worth about half a billion dollars. Meanwhile just a week ago, the Wall Street Journal estimated that Apple earns about 80 million dollars this year as its royalty for apps sold at the Apps store. Who is following whom? Who is capturing the real opportunity and who is only pretending?

Even this is not the genesis of customizing your mobile phone with downloaded services, content and applications. The first phone maker to offer such as service did so back in 2000, first with downloadable ringing tones. And that company to offer a software/services store to download content 9 years ago was.. Nokia... This is years before Apple had launched the iTunes music store for the iPod, when the iPhone was not even a twinkle in the eye of Steve Jobs. Who's the real innovator?

And how far-sighted has this been? Nokia started in 2000, expanded the whole decade, then branded its store (as Ovi) as a supermarket for all content, services and apps, and added apps specifically to its store this May. Where are the other of the big 5 (remember, Apple only sells 1% of the world's phones, LG sells ten times that). Samsung released its Apps store in February of this year (and has about 10,000 apps). LG just released theirs now in June. SonyEricsson promises to open theirs in August. And Motorola is so far lost, they have not even announced an Apps Store. So who is really the innovator and how far ahead has Nokia been in this area? They had a dedicated "Mobile Internet Applications" division to the company as far back as 2000.

Now where was it that I read about Ovi a while back? Oh yeah, Parmy Olson, it was Forbes who was quoted about specifics of Ovi in November 2007. And Nokia's first step to allow customization of phones by downloads, in 2001, was actually singled out as being so innovative and exclusive to be for "Nokia customers alone" as reported by Forbes.

BUT IT DOES GET WORSE

(I really hate sloppy reporting, but this is one of the all-time worst and error-filled article I've ever read) Lets continue. Cue clueless analyst Lee Simpson (of Jeffries and Co). The statements by Lee Simpson are so ludicrous that one wonders what is his motivation. Has he bought Nokia stock options and now needs to push the stock price lower? Or is he just incompetent. Lee starts by saying "All these guys who have nothing to do with mobile are coming into this space with better handsets than Nokia."

Who is he talking about? Makers who were not phone makers? So he is talking about Dell? We don't have Dell's phones yet. Or Apple? Or who? HTC is a phone maker. ZTE is a phone maker, Huawei is a phone maker, Sendo is a phone maker. Google does not make phones. Toshiba is certainly not a newcomer to phones (but maybe they seem new to laggard markets like the USA). Panasonic? NEC? the Japanese makers have made Apple-magnitude amouts of handsets annually this whole decade, they are not newcomers (but they've focused on the far more demanding Japanese market recently). Microsoft doesn't make phones and their mobile phone OS has been around for years before the iPhone. Who are your "all these guys" Lee Simpson? If he means the new phone by watchmakers TAG Heuer, then again, that phone is not even launched yet. Who? The only oneof the "all these guys" with "nothing to do with mobile" making "handsets" with a phone on the market, is Apple. And they entered the phone market two years ago. Lee, you are seriously behind with your news about the industry. Perhaps time to get a Twitter acount? But yes, the only maker who was not a handset maker, who joined this industry, and has a phone already on the market, over the past several years, is Apple. The phone we have to consider then, when Apple truly did have "nothing to do with mobile" was the original iPhone, now known as iPhone 2G, back in June of 2007.

Yes, so Lee Simpson, you say these on-phone makers have brought phones that are "better than Nokia". Now was it really? Since the original iPhone launched, Apple has had to fix deficiencies ie add missing elements, of 3G, GPS and TV-out in 2008, and then even that was not enough to make it a full-featured normal smartphone, Apple had to add autofocus, MMS and video recording in 2009. So since Apple has voluntarily added these changes to the iPhone, it goes without saying, that Apple itself felt the original iPhone was not a complete phone.

But a Nokia smartphone released before the iPhone had all of those features in March of 2007, That phone, the N95, also included features that even the latest iPhone does not have, such as a 5 megapixel camera, a flash, a removable memory card expansion slot, an interchangable battery, stereo Bluetooth, Instant messaging, video calling, VOIP (Voice Over IP), 2D barcode reader and FM radio.

Well, maybe thats not fair, I mean, would this phone be covered in a magazine like Forbes? Or wait, Parmy Olson, The N95 phone was considered so relevant, that it actually was covered in Forbes well before the iPhone, in 2006. In addition to listing its main specs, and specifically four of those that the iPhone 2G would not later have - 5 megapixel, DVD video record, GPS and 3G - your collegue Bruce Upbin raved about it in these words, "the blogosphere is already drooling, and justifyably so."

The only recent "newcomer" who released a significant smartphone was computer-maker Apple. Yes, that phone had impressive innovations, in particular the size of its screen, touch-screen interface and accelerometers, all which have been since copied also (not touch-screen clearly yet as well) by Nokia. Three real innovations. But Nokia's equivalent model at the time had 6 major features that Apple has since copied, and 10 further features that the iPhone did not offer. When Lee Simpson says the non-phone-makers have come into the phone space and made "better" phones than Nokia, it is 100% totally not true. Apple itself had to fix the problems of its first iPhone. And obviously now, we can't even consider Apple as "guys who have nothing to do with mobile" when Apple has been selling phones for 2 years. No, this is totally bogus. Lee Simpson you are incompetent!

BUT IT GETS WORSE STILL

PC and phone convergence. So yes, this sounds so nice. There is a convergence trend happening. PCs are migrating via laptops and notebooks to netbooks. And the basic voice-only cellphones to basic data (SMS) phones to feature phones to smartphones. The current top-end smartphones are very close in abilities to the smallest of the netbooks. There is a renewed interest in "palmtop" computers like early PDAs from the last decade. And Apple's Steve Jobs is on record saying that the iPhone was Apple's entry into the netbooks market. A computer maker says that their smartphone is equivalent to a netbook computer. Yes, that sounds quite innovative. And where has Nokia been in this area? Two years before there was an iPhone, Nokia started to call its premium smartphone line of N-Series, not "mobile phones" but "multimedia computers." Sorry, Parmy Olson. If you did very basic journalistic research, and bothered to examine the facts, you'd see that Nokia was literally one of the first to suggest a smartphone is actually a small computer. Not only thinking that, Nokia was so obvious and vocal to communicate this, at the time radical view - that Nokia plastered that statement in all of their packaging and promtion for the N-Series. (isn't a radical view that is later adopted by your competitor, a sign of true innovation?)

Oh, Parmy Olson, have a guess who wrote about this in 2006? Yeah, your colleague Bruce Upbin at yes, Forbes. He actually used that Nokia marketing phase in the article "multimedia computer"

Failing to catch on to other innovations. Really? Why no examples? Lets turn to the evidence. I already mentioned the trend to services and applications. Most mobile telecoms experts (in advanced markets) feel that the services opportunity is far bigger than the applications opportunity. But Nokia has been innovating in both.

One of the big trends in the mobile industry is open systems. Using standards and with open APIs. With rivals collaborating. Apple's OS/X operating system, and the Apps store, is a tightly controlled monopoly by Apple. That is not the current trend, it is an archaic model from the time of mainframe computers of the 1970s. Apple is decidely against the current trend, totally anti-innovative in its operating system.

How is Nokia? It invited its most powerful rivals at the time, with Motorola (who was bigger than Nokia) and Ericsson as well as PDA-maker Psion. And to promote collaboration, even though Nokia was biggest shareholder, they expanded ownership to include Samsung, Panasonic and Sony. The Symbian operating system has since been turned into non-profit foundation, with fully Open Source Software. This is at the heart of all of Nokia's smartphones. And Nokia was a founding member of Symbian in 1998. Nokia was catching the trend eleven years ago, that still today Apple resists. Who is innovator? 

Hey, you know what, Parmy Olson, this very exact point, that Nokia is open source and Apple is a closed controlled environment, was reported by your colleague Bruce Upbin, in Forbes in 2006.

Another big trend is to embed full digital TV tuners into smartphones. Real crystal-clear broadcast digital TV, not streamed and jittery 3G TV. South Korea was the world's first country to launch these kinds of advanced superphones in 2005 and today 45% of Korean phone owners have them. 32% of Japanese phones are like this. Is Nokia involved? Nokia was creating a "European" digital TV standard called DVB-H at the start of this decade, and provided custom prototype phones for tests that were run for example in Helsinki and Oxford. And Nokia released DVB-H phones for sale in 2008. Where is your Apple, RIM/Blackberry or Palm with in-built digital TV tuners? Who is innovating?

And as to anyone really knowing this? Yes, Parmy Olson, your colleague there at Forbes, Elizabeth Woyke did report on Nokia's interests in mobile TV in 2008.

Then there is the trend to mobile advertising. While the global ad industry is experiencing unprecedented decline of TV ads, newspaper ads, radio, cinema, and even internet advertising, mobile advertising is experiencing phenomenal growth, most analysts suggest it will double this year. The Ad industry talks of this being the year of mobile advertising. Did Nokia notice? Nokia launched its Nokia Ad Service early in 2007 and expanded it to the Nokia Advertising Alliance last year - in line with open principles and collaboration again. Nokia not only has innovated in this area, it has again driven the innovation years before it broke into the mainstream. And while Google obviously does advertising for mobile, who else of the major players?

And there is the trend to full QWERTY keyboards. The article mentions RIM's Blackberries and Palm's Pre which illustrate this trend (as does the N97 also mentioned). The trend to QWERTY keyboards is far bigger than the trend to touch-screen phones. Touch-screens are not that new or innovative, as they originate from early in the previous decade, and even Apple had its touch-screen PDA, the Newton. (And incidentially, Nokia's first touch-screen phone was released 3 years before the iPhone, the 7700). But QWERTY keyboards are now the hot trend and have propelled for example RIM's Blackberries to outsell Apple iPhones by about 2 to 1. And yes, who invented this trend? Not RIM. Five years before the first Blackberry phone, there was the Nokia 9000 Communicator, the first mobile phone with a full QWERTY keyboard. Since then Nokia has expanded its range of QWERTY keyboard phone models and has always had more such models than any other maker. Who is the innovator?

What of 2D barcodes (aka QR codes)? Another invention from Asia, launched by NTT DoCoMo in Japan in 2005. Americans are now just starting to study this technology. In advanced markets it is revolutionizing how internet surfing is done on a phone, being far better than using a keypad or a touch-screen. Four out of five Japanese mobile internet users already use 2D barcodes. Europeans have been moving rapidly to 2D barcodes in countries such as Germany, Spain and the UK. Where is the 2D barcode reader on the iPhone 3GS or Palm Pre or Blackberry? Its not there. Apple will get you a 2D barcode reader software through its Apps Store. But Nokia started to ship phones with 2D barcode readers pre-installed and fully integrated, in 2006. Who is the innovator?

And there is the trend to "digital communities" or "social networking" or "user-generated content" best typified now by Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Such a massive change in society, that Business Week wrote in its cover story in 2005, that this is the biggest change in mankinds's history, since the industrial revolution. Such a big change that the Economist wrote in 2005 in its cover issue that businesses which do not understand it, will not survive. Google's CEO Eric Shmidt said this March that this change is "the defining aspect of humanity over the next 10 or 20 years". So this shift is bigger than smartphones, bigger than mobile telecoms, bigger than the IT, telecoms and media industries. The biggest trend going.
And its interesting to see, that yes, RIM has just announced a Blackberry community and social network, for its users. This is clearly capitalizing on this trend and is truly yes, an innovation by RIM. There is no such social network by any other handset maker... except Nokia. Nokia started its path to capitalize on the social networking trend with the original Lifeblog .. in 2004. Now they offer for example Club Nokia to all Nokia phone owners.

And yes, this trend, and Nokia's interests in it has indeed been chronicled by Forbes, Parmy Olson, first in discussing Lifeblog in 2005, and then discussing the music recommendation community in Forbes in 2006.

It is irresponsible to print such rubbish with no evidence, claiming that Nokia is "failing to catch on the innovations happening in the handset market" when Nokia has invented several of the current strongest trends and been driving the industry to understand most of the others, and in almost every case, Nokia has been there long before its main rivals today, which truth be told, are not Apple or Palm or RIM, all tiny phone makers globally. The big five are Nokia, Samsung LG, SonyEricsson and Motorola. If Parmy Olson wants to write about a handset maker who is "failing to catch innovations" - then Nokia is definitely the least valid example to use, out of the top 5 biggest phone makers.

AND THE TREND TO SMARTPHONES

Finally, the biggest injustice. If the headline of this ridiculous article is "Nokia's Motorola Moment" and Forbes suggests Nokia's current lead is threatened by misunderstanding a change in the market, that is so big, it could destroy the company; and the article throughout uses the specific phone category of smartphones as this giant change which might cause the demise of Nokia, then lets examine that evidence.

First, I have to mention the alternate view, that very expensive superphones are not the engine of sustainable market dominance - 40% global market shares - but rather, that the only way you can control the mass market, is with low-cost mass market devices. The biggest car maker is not Ferrari, it is Toyota. GM made more Chevrolets than Cadillacs; Ford made more Ford branded cars than Lincolns. Even if Nokia was somehow unable to hold onto its share of top-end premium phones (smartphones), it is perfectly feasible to remain the biggest handset maker by volume if Nokia holds onto its market share in the lower end of the handset market. The biggest markets are China and India and teh vast majority of the phones that they buy are low-cost models. But lets leave this alternate strategic option to the side. Lets talk about smartphones.

Depending on the exact definition used, it can be argued that Nokia invented the smartphone market. The early smartphones were business-oriented phones (typified by the original Blackberry). Nokia was the first handset maker to separate a whole division to specialize on only business-oriented smartphones (E-Series), as distinct from the dvision selling mass-market consumer phones. Today we know the far larger smartphone opportunity is the consumer smartphone (typified by the iPhone). Nokia was the first handset maker to offer two separate lines of smartphones, one series of business phones and another consumer phones, setting the consumer smartphones unit as its own division (N-Series). This was years before anyone had seen an iPhone. Very literally Nokia was the first phone maker to even start to sell smartphones as consumer phones (as distinct from business phones). Note that recently RIM followed this same trend and released consumer-oriented smartphones and doubled its sales. Again a rival follows Nokia's lead.

Today Nokia is bringing the smartphone to mainstream consumers and sells more mid-range mid-price smartphones than top-end N-Series smartphones. Nokia has literally three separate divisions selling smartphones to different customer segments. Apple has two phone models in total. Nokia has powerfully driven the ever wider acceptance of smartphones.

Maybe this is too much of a finer point of nerdy techie geeky strategy details, that really go so obscure, that the Forbes reader would not really care, right, Parmy Olson? No, wait, Forbes did cover this very matter, Apple's iPhone vs Nokia mass market smartphones in volume, last year printing the Nokia strategy statement that these lwer price new Nokia smartphones are "for a much broader mass market."

In absolute numbers, Nokia today sells more smartphones than the four rival brands mentioned in the article, Apple, RIM, Toshiba and Palm combined. For the latest quarter, Nokia's global handset market share grew to 38%. That is for all phones. But for smartphones, Nokia's market share was 41%. Nokia, the world's biggest handset maker, is performing better in smartphones than overall in all types of phones. Which part of this performance signals a giant that is "lagging behind" and headed to a "Motorola Moment"?

The Forbes article suggests that the West "is trending" towards smartphones. Yes, the US and Canada are indeed now snapping up smartphones and about a quarter of all phones sold in these two countries are smartphones. But the phone market for Europe is twice the size of the USA, and is so far further ahead of America, that next year half of all phones sold in Europe will be smartphones (says the EU commissioner). And who is by far the best-selling smartphone in Europe, not Palm, not Toshiba, not RIM, not Apple. Its Nokia. The company has correctly anticipated the shifts in the market, and achieved the success in the most important market by size. Why is this leading Nokia to a Motorola Moment?

Now, the global economy is in the toilet. Hundreds of giant global branded companies have gone bankrupt. The recent economic news has been reports after reports of IT companies making losses. The handset market is shrinking. SonyEricsson just reported losses and all signs suggest Motorola will also post losses. Nokia has not only grown market share from the previous quarter, but did this while making profits. Yes, the profits are down but find me any global manufacturer whose profits did not decline from this time last year, before the global recession struck. That Nokia did make profits where rivals make losses, says that Nokia is executing particularly well, in exceptionally difficult economic times. And where did you Parmy Olson see a Motorola Moment in this?

This was one of the worst articles I've ever read about any mobile telecoms related topic, by any major periodical. Shame on you Forbes. Shame. Parmy Olson you have been negligent in your duties as a journalist to check sources for your story. And even worse, you have been patently unprofessinoally lazy to not even bother to read past Forbes stories about Nokia. Your colleagues have accurately covered essentially every item you managed to get wrong. (Management ahoy, perhaps this "journalist" is not really fit for the job?) and Lee Simpson, you are either incompetent or biased or both. Shame!

TWO CLARIFICATIONS

I am now (19 July) adding two clarifications, after reading all the comments left so far (thank you all who left comments!). I think it is very important to just keep these two issues clear

Innovation has nothing to do with usability. Many who have commented here, or on various forums, read between the lines in the Forbes article, and perhaps also inject their own personal experiences with recent Nokia smartphones (vs iPhone in particular) and think, but there is a point, the iPhone is far better to use than Nokia. That may be true, but it has nothing to do with innovation. If the Forbes article had been entitled "Nokia smartphones not as easy to use, this may be Nokia's Motorola Moment" - I'd have NO problem with that premise. I'd examine the evidence, but probably would agree. Certainly, I totally agree - totally agree - that Apple's iPhone is by far the best phone out there in terms of usability. (I said so earlier in this blog article!) But usability is not innovation and innovation is not usability.

It is like if I said, "it is raining", and you replied, "the sea is calm". They have nothing to do with each other. Each can be independently true or false, It can be raining and the seas be calm. It can be raining and the seas be stormy. It can be a day of sunshine and seas calm. It can be day of sunshine and seas wild. They both happen to deal with water but are not in any way linked.

Innovation is the introduction of some new technology or ability or gadget or feature etc into some industry. It is almost always "clumsy" at first intoduction. The first plane, Wright's Flier was very tricky to operate. So was the first car by Daimler Benz, so was the first computer in Bletchley Park. So was the first home video recorder by Philips. The first phones were so bad to use, that the user could not call anyone. You could only ask the switchboard operator to connect your call, even if you wanted to call your neighbor. It took 20 years until Almon Stowger looked at the phone, and decided it can be better, and invented the rotary dial, and for the first time, normal phone users could make phone calls. That does not invalidate the original invention of the telephone. Usability comes usually later. We can have total innovation with horrible usability. We can also have improved usability with no innovation. Most bug-fixes and minor software upgrades we all experience on our PCs are not innovations, but do make the usability better (or should do, ha-ha).

It is possilble to innovate in usability, but usability is only one element of a complex gadget as a mobile phone. It is very possible that usability is "the defining attribute" today in 2009, in the modern smartphone market and if Nokia was so horrible at it, that might be a Motorola Moment - But that would be a totally different Forbes article. But innovation is ONLY about doing something new, and doing it first. Whether it is usable or not, matters not at all on the FACT of innovation. It is very common that the original innovator does not create the most successful product and it is very common that companies that specialize in usability will refine such products (like for example Sony and Apple). I think you get my point. Forbes did no argue that "Nokia is facing its Motorola Moment because its Symbian OS is uncomfortable to use (vs the iPhone)". Forbes arrgued Nokia is facing its Motorola Moment because currently there is a lot of disruptive innovation going on (true) and many of its rivals are innovating like Apple, RIM, Palm and Toshiba (also true) but that Nokia is not innovating is TOTALLY untrue. I listed in this blog  Excluding all the items of features I mentioned about either the N95 or N97, in the blog I listed 9 truly giant innovations for the industry, where Nokia has been at the beginning, and far ahead of Apple, Palm, RIM and Toshiba. I could add many more, but those should be enough, as most of those innovations have been already mentioned in past editions of Forbes.

So please do not start another argument that this OS is better than that OS, it is TOTALLY not the point of the Forbes article and the errors in it. I'll grant you all arguments about the OS. It is irrelevant to the Forbes article. Has Nokia been innovative or not (however miserably poorly that may have been executed) is the only point. If Nokia has been innovative recently, and Forbes says lack of innovation causes Motorola Moment, then this argument by Forbes falls. Lets not argue after this ridiculously long blog, about whose OS (or usability) is better. Forbes claimed Nokia in trouble because Nokia does not innovate. Lets discuss whether Nokia is innovating (hwever poorly or well that is executed)

Innovation vs Strategy. Also there are some who like the conclusion of the Forbes article without considering the merits of the argument. There is a lot of feeling out there that Nokia is about to lose its market (totally irrespective of whether Nokia has innovated, some have even said Nokia innovates too much and needs control and discipline and focus, to select a few innovations and perfect those rather than to do everything). On any other issues, is it smart to sell ultra-cheap phones - to capture India, Afirca etc - or the shift in organizational abilities and staff competences from a haredware company to a software company, etc, that has nothing to do with innovation. I am happy to discuss Nokia strategies (or Apple, RIM, Palm, Toshiba; or any other handset maker; or any other player in the mobile space like Vodafone, Google, Microsoft, etc) but for you reading my blog for the first time - I have a treat for you. I am already into a series of strategy articles about the market wars of smartphones. We HAVE this discussion elsewhere. I will discuss all those factors, the role of OS, the role of software, the role of the user interface; as well as other complex matters such as handset subsidies, carrier relationsships, multiple handset ownership, replacement cycles (and price!), etc, in that series of articles about the smartphone market. Please lets move the discussion about Nokia strategies there, unless the Nokia strategy is about innovation.

Because innovation does not require a smartphone! Look at Nokia again. It sells many ultra-cheap handsets (non smartphones) in Africa, India, Latin America etc - which have the FM radio as a feature. It was Nokia who first deployed an FM radio into a phone, a true Nokia innovation for mobile phones. Now, in Africa most of the population is so poor that they don't own TVs or PCs. They cannot afford to buy a daily newspaper. More than half of the population do not have even a household radio (FM radio). Now, when Nokia offers FM radio as a feature on a phone - and about 30% of Africans already have a phone - it is a VERY compelling feature. Innovation yes. Do you (my reader) buy your hot new smartphone because it has FM radio - no. You probably didn't even notice if it had it. But in Africa (India, Paistan, Indonesia, China, Brazil, Russia....) that FM radio feature is currently among the most desired features. (and that conveniently brings my count of Nokia innovations to ten. Not just increasing the megapixel count on a camera, but true giant industry invvoations)

This blog and this counter-argument is only to Forbes articles silly statement that Nokia is not innovating (anymore) in this industry. If I have proven that Nokia is innovating, no matter how irrelevant that innovation is to you, or how poorly you think it is executed, then Forbes is wrong. It may still be true, that Nokia is on a wrong strategy on something else, but on innovation, they have been doing that very well in the past, including very recent past.

AM NOT APPLE-BASHING

And just to be clear, especially to any Apple fans and followers. I am not intending to "dump" on Apple. I am going through the facts of this silly Forbes article, which made those ourageous statements. It ws Forbes who did mention Apple/iPhone on seven separate occasions in the article (all other supposedly innovative smartphones, Palm Pre, Toshiba, RIM/Blackberry, get a combined 5 mentions). It was not me who drew a comparison of "Apple vs Nokia" in innovation, it was Forbes. I am not in any way against Apple (nor RIM, Palm or Toshiba), only correcting the blatant errors where they relate to innovation. It is not an opinion of mine, it is a fact, that the original iPhone was a 2G device. It was Apple, not me, who felt 3G was an improvement to the iPhone and so much so, that for the first re-design of the iPhone, they named the newer device "iPhone 3G". Thus 3G is recognized by Apple as an innovation. Now the reality is that Nokia's N95 was a 3G device more than a year earlier; and Nokia's first 3G smartphone was released in 2003. It is not "Apple-bashing" to report these facts, and I did not select the comparison, the "standard" of innovation to measure Nokia, to be Apple. Please don't blame me, blame that silly Forbes journalist.

But to be clear. Apple is a fantastic company, I have loved them for decades, I was a Macintosh trainer for an Authorized Apple Dealer in New York City early in my professional career. I loved the Lisa, the Mac, the Newton, the iPod. I thought so highly of iTunes that I made it the second case study of my fourth book, Communities Dominate Brands (the signature book for this blog). I eagerly awaited the "Apple iPod phone" for more than two years before the iPhone was announced. I was most supportive of the original iPhone announcement and posted immediate reviews and commentary, including the world's first prediction of how the iPhone would do in the market. Not overhype like some, not dismissing its chances like others, but I forecasted one day after the original iPhone was announced in January 2007, that yes, Apple would hit its 10M initial sales target, with a detailed analysis of why. That blog was very widely referenced. Then a month before the iPhone was launched, in May 2007 I wrote a comprehensive analysis of what its impact would be. Not only to phones, but to the IT industry, the internet business, media, and advertising. That blog was widely praised. My predictions proved very accurate.

I was very honest about the first iPhone, and explained clearly what was wrong with it, why it would not become a world hit (as it did not, the first iPhone was only a market success in America). Clearly Apple management completely agreed with all but one of my recommendations, because they have made those changes to the two revised editions, iPhone 3G and 3GS. I was not Apple-bashing, I was trying to help. And whether anybody in Cupertino happened to read my blogs or not, essentially all of my recommendations have been implemented, except for the slider QWERTY keyboard (which may still come, mark my words). Please understand, that I felt in 2007 that the original iPhone was a good phone, but an incomplete smartphone. Yet I boldly predicted that inspite of initial shortcomis, Apple would hit its sales targets. I will not let my personal views interfere with honest, factual reporting.

Since then the iPhone 3G, new pricing, better global availability and the Apps Store have all helped to bring Apple greater success. Now the iPhone 3GS is a brilliant device. Apple has achieved a lot of cross-sell and up-sell opportunities and the iPhone has helped the sales of both the Macs and the iPods. I don't hate Apple and I don't hate the iPhone. I greatly admire the company. Now recently I have been urging Apple to expand its product line (many Apple fans agree, hoping for an iPhone Nano as its often called). But for this article a journalist said Apple is more innovative than Nokia in phones. And it is honestly true, that while the iPhone is now teaching many new users to access the internet on a phone - and yes, the web surfing is BY FAR most user-friendly on an iPhone - yet Nokia did invent the real internet-surfing mobile phone ten years prior to the iPhone. Now, when that journalist explicity mentions "web surfing" as an area of innovation by which Nokia is behind - and a fellow Forbes journalist has acknowledged this ability in a Nokia phone 8 years earlier - then I have to mention this error.

I am not Apple-bashing. If the journalist had mentioned Samsung seven times or Palm or Motorola or RIM, I would have compared Nokia to that brand. It is not personal about Apple. I love Apple. But I needed to correct errors about Nokia. And trust me, if someone made as silly statements about Apple, I'd be as fiercely there to defend Apple. I defend the truth (and attack incompetence and unprofessionalism). I'm sorry if any Apple fans were offended. (Blame Forbes ha-ha..)

Comments

[mark]

Oops, it looks like the site lost the rest of your article, which I'm eager to digest. (By the way, thanks for your informative articles on the smartphone market, hysteria, and US vs world.)

As for this post, I read the transcript of yesterday's Nokia conference call, and it was both good and bad. The good: Nokia knows they have to change and are trying to do so; changing the Nokia culture to focus on what they call "solutions" (based on user experience) vs "products". The bad: Nokia is still talking about it (and in somewhat vague terms when questioned by analysts) but this is what Apple already does - and Apple doesn't talk about it, they just do it. And during the call, Nokia's CEO pointed out five key things about the future "smartphone" industry. Great, but Apple already is doing or set up for all of them but one (openness - partnership).

Just to be clear, I don't think Nokia is doomed, but there's a lot to be desired at Nokia as the industry moves into the next phase of mobile handsets.

[Tomi Ahonen]

Hi Mark

No problem. Actually you were reading the early draft which did not yet have the conclusion posted, so yeah, there was more to come. I hope you come back to read it in full.

I am not suggesting that Nokia has been perfect by any means, the N-Gage for example and first iteration of Club Nokia are good examples of strategic mistakes. But when the whole global economy is tanking, essentially all (non telecoms) IT companies making losses, and at least two of Nokia's direct rivals, SonyEricsson and Motorola post losses, and as the market itself contracts for phone sales; that Nokia is able to hold onto market share - and make profits, that is competent management.

The Nokia culture is one of worrying about losing their lead. There is a lot of management-induced panic that is quite deliberate, knowing the Asians in general, and the South Koreans specifically, will not sit still.

But while their recent newest phones have not totally wowed the world (and thinking back in time, most times its been like that, mild disappointments almost always), Nokia has all bases covered. All bases. Not perfect in all, by any means, and Symbian OS seems to be the biggest headache right now, but Nokia is by far the most completely prepared for all trends in the industry. If it goes ultra-low-cost, Nokia can do it. If low-cost phone owners migrate to mid-phones, Nokia is there. If the money is made in smartphones, like I wrote, Nokia outperforms its total market share, in smartphones.

If the future shifts from devices to services and apps, Nokia is by far the furthest along on both the shift to services and to apps. If the fight is centered around the operating system (like profits in the PC world), Nokia took control of Symbian. If the future is all advertising and free, Nokia is there. If the future is social networking, Nokia is there as well. (they even have the NokiaSiemens Networking unit)

What don't they have? Touch screens? Touch Screens were under 3% of all phones sold last year and Nokia is getting into those now. Big deal.

No time to panic but obviously, its very rough and tough, no time to stop fighting either. It'll get more competitive next year than its now.

Thank you for writing

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[Vlad]

Another excellent post, as usual. Glad to see you too are (continuously) doing your part in uncovering the lies that have been thrown at Nokia constantly in the past few weeks (I try my best too). If I didn't know better, I'd think there's a campaign against Nokia going on. Very strange.

If that incredibly factless Gizmodo review wasn't enough, now we seem to have very "deep" analysis of Nokia's results, from a wide range of "publications" or blogs, in more than one instance completely missing the point. And by far.

I'd link to a few of my (angry) posts covering these so-called stories, but I'm against filling comments with links to one's own site.

Anyway, do keep it up. I stand by you and your opinions. And more people should stand by facts, like you always do.

[Shelter28]

I'm not an industry expert, and so can't give any valuable insight or comments. I'm giving my two cents based on my experiences as a mobile user and what I can see around me.

There's certainly a lot of hype for the Iphone. Even in my country Malaysia everyone knows of the newcomer. It certainly has become an object of desire for a lot of people. With careful operator bundling (in Malaysia its the Telco Maxis) a lot of people are trying it out. Recently even my 63 year old father in law changed his phone to an Iphone. I haven't got a chance to talk to him about his experiences though.

What I can observe is just that around me I still don't see that many Iphone users despite the hype and notoriety. Maybe that confirms the figures. I'm curious though if things will change in time, really curious, especially for Asia. We all know Tomi is completely enamored with SMS. And he has repeatedly say that according to figures Asia is big on SMS. I agree with that, as I live in Asia myself and am part of that SMS culture. What I'm curious about is if Iphone (probably not that good at texting, but I have not really tried it myself) will change the game here. I'm curious if the things that Iphone is good at (looks, interface, user experience) are enough to make it a mainstream device in Asia or will it just stop at being a status thing? Talking about status, the other time Tomi blogged about people in Indonesia buying the most expensive Nokia regardless of the functionality, I wonder if Apple will also become a status device where people in Asia buy it just to show off. Or perhaps it has already become one.

Well, I'm still using Nokia (N97 now), my wife is using Nokia (E51), my father is using Nokia, my other extended family members use either Nokia, Samsung, LG, or Sony Erricson. No Iphone yet except my father in law (whom I know got the phone for status among his friends, as he also uses an Imac, but boots into Windows most of the time). I have only one friend using Iphone. What is interesting is that she claimed she likes the phone so much that she evangelizes it to her family and now all her family members are sworn IPhone users. These are typical Asians. Do you think Apple is doing the right thing?

[aardman]

It's not about which phone maker offers the most features and at the earliest dates. You can have all the bells and whistles but if it's a big pain in the a** to use those features then they're basically useless. Nokia's big problem is software. Just like Sony, Nokia couldn't write software for sh*t. Part of the reason is that it seems they just don't think about the ergonomics of software design. Another reason is Symbian is basically an obsolete OS. Third, open platforms (one OS - many devices) is probably on its way out. The smartphone OS is getting quite powerful but the price of that power is complexity. And the complexity increases probably exponentially if you have to make that OS work in lots of different devices from so many manufacturers. This is Windows' problem and it's fast becoming Symbian's problem as well.

[NKL]

"Even in my country Malaysia everyone knows of the newcomer... With careful operator bundling (in Malaysia its the Telco Maxis) a lot of people are trying it out. "

2 months ago, I spoken to a person who works in Maxis. He said iPhone 3G was not moving as fast as expected.

"I'm curious if the things that Iphone is good at (looks, interface, user experience) are enough to make it a mainstream device in Asia or will it just stop at being a status thing?"

In my opnioin, iPhone (in Malaysia) will be a status thing and a niche device.

[NKL]

"Nokia's big problem is software. Just like Sony, Nokia couldn't write software for sh*t. Part of the reason is that it seems they just don't think about the ergonomics of software design"

I think the original author should rephrase it as "Nokia's big problem is operating system."
If so, I concur. But I believe Nokia sees the current OS's limitation (I would not say it's a problem) and decided to make OS an open source in order to break through the limitation. In which is a good move.

[Tomi Ahonen]

Hi Vlad, Shelter28, aardman and NKL

Thank you all for your comments. I will respond to each individually.

Vlad - thanks and cheers. Yes, I know you too get really offended when some supposedly reputable sources spread untruths. This is a difficult enough industry with all the complexity, we don't need added confusion by untruths.

Shelter28 - thanks. I did not mean this blog story to be anything "anti-Apple" but it was simply because the original silly Forbes journalist decided to make that commparison. I would have done an equal job if they had picked LG or Blackberry or Motorola..

(I have just added the ending paragraphs to clarify, I do not intend to be Apple-bashing). These comments here were posted prior to that addition by me.)

But yes, good points. About iPhone usability - it is by far better than any other phone, far better than a Nokia. Not for everything, not for everyone, but for example your father-in-law, yes we hear that all the time. People you would never expect to start to surf the "mobile internet" are spontaneously doing it on iPhones. It is a magical, transformational device.

About SMS on the iPhone - there is actually a comparison, found that the iPhone is significantly better for SMS than basic T9 keypads but not quite as good as QWERTY keyboards like a Blackberry. But yes, iPhones are good for SMS, but you have to "re-learn" how to type with it, not using your thumbs, but using your fore-fingers (pointing fingers). Different way to hold the phone, but it is very fast and accurate once you learn that way.

Status symbol, yes, but the problem with that is fashion and cycles. The iPhone looks "the same" as it did 2 years ago. Its no longer hot and new and radical. So Apple needs a new (appearance) edition to renew its appeal. But it is not an exclusive benefit. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What someone thinks is fabulous, someone else thinks is too flashy or too wide or too fancy etc. We have different tastes, someone loves a Ferrari, another loves a Hummer...

About is Apple doing right thing, one thing they are doing wrong and that is limiting their model range to these 2 models. They need at least 4 models, one per quarter of the year. Then they have a great chance to grow size. Now they have a big sales spike in the summer and another for Christmas, but its down hill after that. Need more models.

aardman - you make a good point and I kind of agree with you, but it does not address the issue. Like Thomas Edison said about invention, it is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. Yes, we do need to make our gadgets easier to use. But that is by definition not innovation, it is improvement. Apple is brilliant at that, making its devices always even better. Look at the Macintosh, 25 years after launch, it is still the best computer to use, by far better than Windows PCs.. But that is not innovation. Innovation is really what you said does not matter - it is the new feature and the date it was first done. It does NOT matter if it is easy to use or not. Almost any device is initially difficult. But it is still innovation. And innovation is what that Forbes journalist decided to write about. And that is what I took issue with.

But I agree with you, Apple is brilliant at its usability and continues to lead with that, including obviously wiht phones.

As to Symbian OS, I won't get into a debate about its specifics. I'll grant you it is old and shows its age. It was, however, originally developed by, and since then evolved by, phone makers. Apple's OS/X, Microsoft's Windows Mobile, Google's Android and Linux Mobile are all computer operating systems adapted for mobile. There are compromises in that approach, even if your OS is newer. Take just one point, multi-tasking. Symbian has been doing that rather comfortably (if your phone has the memory obviousyl) for a long while already, most of its rivals can't do it.. So Symbian has still plenty going for it.

NKL (first posting) thanks for the info and yes, I agree iPhone will be in all markets, not just Malaysia, except for North America, all other markets it will be a niche product. US and Canada it may well succeed to be an expensive mass market phone.

NKL (second posting) yeah, Symbian Open Source is one deliberate effort to address the software issues.

Thank you all for writing

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[Yannick]

Oh my god, BEAUTIFUL !! Talk about setting the record straight !!! And that Forbes article really only reflects what thousands of other "pundits" are thinking and saying... plus, almost everything you're saying applies in one way or another to SonyEricsson as well.

Congrats on a job well done!!

[Rafe]

I enjoyed reading this piece. I read the same article (and there's been several like this) and begun to wonder if I was missing something. Clearly a lot of these views seem to originate from the US and I think part of the issue is market isolationism (i.e. viewing the mobile world through the perspective of your home market - something we're all guilty of to an extent - when in reality every market has it unique attributes). There also seems to be a lack of a holistic view - its easy to look at the surface or a limited extent, its harder to a wider view. People who right Symbian OS off as out-dated / slow etc. really do not know what they are talking about (though the touch UI that sits on top is much more debateable).

Nokia does have its problems (like most companies really). The high end smartphone market is quite reasonably cited as an area where they have been weak in the last year or so (relative to their success elsewhere). Is that going to last? I think it would be a brave person who bet that Nokia would make no response at all. The issue for Nokia has been the touch screen phone trend, which they should have caught better. For all this Nokia are still the leader by a long way in the non-touchscreen phone space (RIM is their only real competition).

I think you can make a reasonable case that Nokia currently has software / service engineering development problems. But it's not really surprising, Nokia is transforming itself as they talked about frequently in the last 2 years. It's no easy task, especially because of the scale of Nokia's scope and reach. There's certainly plenty of counter evidence pointing a brighter long term future (DNA like the acquisition of Navteq, creation Symbian Foundation, Ovi strategy and the talk of operation with MNOs, Qt led platform strategy, Webruntimes etc.). Moreover this is non an isolated issue. All of Nokia's competitors face the same issue as the mobile market evolves and continues to expand into / converge with other sectors. Some are coming from the other direction (how doe we produce good hardware), some have scale issue (RIM as enterprise only, Apple's desire to protect its 'elite' brand and expand at same time etc etc.

[Boro]

THIS is the worst article I have ever read, not the FORBES one. Only a complete moron can write the Nokia was "6 years ahead of Apple" at the time when Apple wasn't even making cell phones. Well - Apple has been making computers for decades and Nokia still didn't come up with one! What a nonsense... If Nokia made a computer, a better one than anyone else, would you say - "oooh, do you know when Apple had GUI?"
Nokia is not innovative company. It's the same old story. They were world market leaders and didn't feel they have to make a REALLY good product, because, well - "we're No. 1, so why try harder". And they were punished.
Speaking of predictions, my first Symbian Nokia was N70, second was N73 (I had 5 Nokia phones before that). (Let's not talk about their quality, that's another story. I get really mad talking about that garbage).
Well, when I got it, I said: "This is shameful half-product and it's unbelievable they are asking customers to PAY for THIS??? They should be paying US!!"
So, I was right, and you were wrong... Like you were all through the article.
To use this.. Symbian - you call it innovative?!?
It is the worthless piece of junk I have ever used! Not even the Windows 1.0 was that bad in PC environment!
Symbian to OS X is like steam locomotive to "Enterprise".

So, "it's the OS, stupid!"
The fact is: it's a shame for such a big company that a newcomer to the market showed them how it should have been done. They were supposed to do it.
I've been saying for years (even before the iPhone) that Symbian is dead end, a software zombie. Not to mention that awful, non-working, buggy PC Suite.

Somehow I understand (when you are a Nokia fanboy) that you want to "prove" how your favorite company is actually the best. But to write an article this long, without saying almost anything right... well, I think you need medical help. Mr Ahonen, this is not soccer. We all gain by destroying shameful Nokia and by using better products.
Why? Because people tend to stay brand loyal. That is the ONLY reason Nokia is still the smartphone market leader (going down, thank God). People don't even know how much better the iPhone is.
And if, for example, Nokia buys Palm, would you kill yourself? Would you feel betrayed by Nokia?
Their future should be (if there's any justice) to be leaders in low-end, small profit margine phones. That's what they deserve for making such a crap Symbian based phones.
Of course, we know there's no justice in technology world (just look at the Microsoft). There's a real danger Nokia is next MS.

Nokia never invented anything really revolutionary. Apple did. There is not ONE single feature in Nokia Symbian phones that is better than any on iPhone. Oh, right... the 46325 megapixel camera... Well, since I know something about photography - you only need a GOOD 3 Mpxl camera... It's about the chip size, not megapixels. For anything else, buy a digital camera.

The only way for Nokia is to dump Symbian and start from scratch ("oh yes, but then we have to make a REAL good OS... but we're not innovative enough"). They need a completely new OS to compete with OS X. Or, they should just leave this to the real innovative companies, because they are not one.
To use a Symbian as a flagship OS...oh, please, gimme a break...

[Mike]

Interesting reading but probably "preaching to the choir". I have been able to do things on my Nokia phones for years that my MD brother and my wife still cannot do on their iPhones...but, and it is a big but, my wife now actually uses her phone more than our computer for her Internet work and email...something I thought I would never see. And the key, I think from watching her, is the UI. I even watched a 6-year old start playing with my wife's phone and figure out how to manipulate images without any input from the adults in the room.
The other issues that Nokia will face in the US are marketing related. No major carrier support until recently with the E71x at AT&T, and that is nominal support from a promotion point of view. And the other issue is brand promotion in general. You cannot spend 30 minutes in front of the television without seeing an iPhone or some variation of RIM, LG, HTC etc being advertised. Let's face it...in the US image is everything and substance can be lost in the translation. Nokia had better be prepared to spend big bucks either directly or in co-op advertising funds if they expect to penetrate this market.
I can speak from painful experience that being an innovator and first to market with a technology only gets you somewhere if you can afford to create an effective marketing strategy that makes people aware of what you have and who you are.

[Chad]

WOW...
Did you really need 6,056 words and a gazillion column inches to make your point?!?

You basically use all of the time and energy to rant against single reporter and one noteworthy publication. This view of the mobile industry is not just held by Olson and Forbes. There's much debate and discussion as to which handset makers / software developers / service providers have the vision of where the industry is headed and if they all are equipped to win the hearts and minds of consumers.

Your diatribe against Forbes must mean they make an argument that you do not agree with; that Nokia has and continues to squander any advantages they have in mobile handset development.

All of the reporting and quoting you single out are not necessarily factually incorrect, they're just an opinion based on research and interviewing. Could she have done a more thorough and complete job? Yes, definitely. Would Forbes have had the time, space, or inclination to give her 6,056 words and a gazillion column inches to make her point. NO

Admittedly this is your space and you can say what you want using however much space you want to use to say it.

This little comment is my space to do the same and I'll say this...

Try exercising a little more journalistic control and make your point without so many words and stop attacking a single source when media in general hold many of the same views.

245 words used here to make MY point

[Boro]

I couldn't agree more with Chad. Exactly what I wanted to say.

[Harri Salminen]

Thanks for this great article. As you wrote, Nokia has been (and still is) probably the best when it comes to adding new features to phones, just think about camera, keyboard, new cellular transmitters of different kinds, web browers, DVD-recording etc. They will solve the technical problems and use new technology, but is the end result really usable? Do people like to use the new solution, or are they more likely to stick whith the old way of doing things? I'm afraid that usually the first implementation of the new solution is acceptable only for hardcore nerds, but not for average users. Nokia does the dirty job, creates the new solution and makes the mistakes. Then other manufacturers follow and know how to do the trick and what to avoid - they make the solution usable.

I'd argue that less really would be more with Nokia. They should make the choice of the most important features and improve those with fresh thinking.

[Rodrigo Mazzilli]

Folks, Nokia is about hardware. Apple iPhone is about the software, the platform.
The mobile platform war takes place now on the OS level, on the best development environments.
As much as Nokia's Finnish fanboys try to say that Nokia is innovative by integrating a X megapixel camera, its smartphones have lacked the usability of Apple's. Apple simple but elegant SpringBoard is per se also an innovation. (if you don't know what the SpringBoard is, go do some research before criticizing Apple).

My father got a new E71 smartphone from Nokia. I am a computer scientist and it took me +30 min to configure the damn thing to work smoothly with wi-fi and configure email. And it turns out he does use the browser and email on that at all, because it's too difficult.

Innovation in mobile devices is NOT about supporting copy-paste or has a huge X megapixel camera. It's about user experience. And Apple is truly winning.
Watch this video and show me something equivalent from Nokia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CNCOtH3hMk

[The Marketing Intern]

To a lot of the commenters above of the Boro and Chad ilk, I think you're missing the point here. The point is that Forbes ran an article saying that Apple is an innovator in mobile devices. What Tomi is pointing out is that those "innovations" were often not the invention of Apple, and therefore they are NOT innovators in many respects. Tomi is not claiming that Nokia phones are better; he is simply stating that much of the technology present in the iPhone was present in Nokia smartphones long before the former implemented them. Whether or not this technology was usable is irrelevant - it existed first, which gives Nokia rights to the term "innovator." Apple, in these cases, isn't an innovator; it's a renovator.

Granted, this article is a little long, and the point could probably be made in 2,000 words. But the analysis is thorough, and I, for one, am thankful for it. Good on ya, Tomi.

[Yannick]

Boro, you can call a whole bunch of people "Nokia fanboys", but YOUR comments REAK of Apple fanboyism.

"There is not ONE single feature in Nokia Symbian phones that is better than any on iPhone. Oh, right... the 46325 megapixel camera... Well, since I know something about photography - you only need a GOOD 3 Mpxl camera... It's about the chip size, not megapixels. For anything else, buy a digital camera."

If you "know something about photography", do you wanna have a go and dare say that the iPhone's CCD chip is "good" ?? Try. Also, funny that you should single out "Nokia SYMBIAN phones", becomes awfully convenient for winning points on your future posts, isn't it? Nokia's portfolio ranges from the absolute cheapest black & white, to the Vertu. And since the original Forbes article was about "Nokia having a Motorola moment", and not "Nokia vs. Apple" it's ridiculous to single out smartphones or Symbian phones just for the sake of being able to come back stronger with pro-Apple arguments.

Let me tell you, sure the iPhone has got a great OS, but I don't know a single person who prefers the iPhone to the Blackberry for business, and I don't know that many people who are knowledgeable in phones that find the iPhone a better value than say, an E71. (unless of course, you're a sold Apple fan, which you seem to be).

Don't get me wrong, i like the iPhone, but it's not the "Jesus phone".

Wanna talk about RIM, HTC, S-E or others? Know anything about them?

[Tomi Ahonen]

Hi all, I am just about to board a plane for 13 hours, i will respond to each of you here tomorrow when i have landed. Please do keep the comments coming and please come back tomorrow or Monday to see the responses and continue the dialog.

gotta rush they are calling my plane

Tomi Ahonen

[Mobile Observer]

You're a raging, frustrated Nokiatard which is understandable. The hardware era where Nokia sold loaded hardware used as dumb featurephones is over, now it's software and usability era and Nokia is clueless about it. The S60 V5 is a half-assed attempt to piggy back a touch layer on the UI fossil S60 with crap result.