Business Week reporting: Market share dwindling, stock cratering, persistent takeover talk. How the CEO is trying to lead Nokia past its epic failure...
... Pride can kill a company. So can bad management. Nokia suffered from both—and terrible timing, too. Four years ago it was the undisputed king of cell phones. Now its share of the smartphone market has plummeted from 49 percent, prior to the 2007 introduction of the iPhone, to 25 percent in the first quarter of 2011, according to Gartner Group (IT). It's still the largest maker of simpler, non-smart phones—it sells a million a day, many of them in China and India—but the company is already getting hurt by a throng of lower-cost Asian rivals. Sensing a giant on the ropes, recruiters from Intel and Google have set up shop in Helsinki hotel rooms, hoping to poach Nokia's top technologists. Thus far there haven't been mass defections, a testament to the value of national pride and extensive benefits. "Something is holding people there," says Benoit Schillings, a former Nokia executive who is now chief technology officer of mobile software maker Myriad Group. "These are extremely dedicated people, but there's a limit."
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