NOKIA HAS appointed its first non-Finnish chief executive in a bid to restore the world’s biggest mobile phone maker to health after losing the initiative to Apple and Google in the fast-growing smartphone market.
Stephen Elop, head of business at Microsoft, will replace Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, a 30-year Nokia veteran who had come under fire from investors for the failure to find an answer to the Apple iPhone, Research in Motion’s BlackBerry and a range of devices using Google’s Android software.
Canadian Mr Elop (46) vowed to raise Nokia’s game in North America, where it has a weak presence, and challenge the shift in industry innovation to the US west coast. “There are new patterns of communication and innovation taking place first in North America,” he said.
“That’s a shift from years before when the development of the mobile industry tended to start in Asia and move through Europe and then to North America. Now there’s fresh innovation in North America and it’s critically important for Nokia to be participating in that market.”
The change follows months of unrest among Nokia investors over the plunging share price, which has fallen by almost two-thirds since the iPhone was launched in 2007, wiping about €60 billion off group’s market capitalisation.
Jorma Ollila, Nokia chairman, said Mr Elop had been brought in to improve execution and accelerate Nokia’s shift in focus from hardware to software and mobile services. – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2010)
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