That's truly interesting...
It does appear, more giving the timing, to reveal a whiff of desperation...
And, it clearly enough contains at least a couple of "double edged sword" type risks...
If they ship too early and then prominently fall on their faces with features that don't work, yet... with the spotlight squarely on them ? That will be the "pony crapping on the stage" moment truly worth fearing... given it won't be market geeks and analysts who are watching and "spinning"... rather than customers voting with wallets.
Then, if the delayed release of competitors products works only to reveal that others have come up with better implementations ?
Even timely "corrections" that keep NOK technically neck and neck with competitors in the "ecosystem", after addressing issues that might be purely OS induced problems... that likely won't be useful in overcoming the impact of mis-steps that occur when you're the only one in the spotlight...
And, of course, that's all still simply assuming that the new OS "ecosystem" has its own "brand appeal"... rather than something very much like the opposite ? So, somehow, between now and September... all Nokia has to do is change the world's opinion... and convince the world that having Microsoft operating systems in your phone is suddenly "cool" ?
LOL!!!
This is a "tech" battle only in part... In larger part it is a BRANDING war...
Leaves me wondering how much of their OWN cash MSFT is going to be putting up here for marketing... with a focus that includes meeting the marketing requirements... for more than themselves? And, of course, how good a job they're going to be able to do of meeting that need to shift market opinion... may well determine NOK's survival ?
At this point... I think they'll probably need to spend a lot of money... just trying to convince people to keep an open mind... much less "preparing the battlefield" by inducing enough of an sense of expectation that what's coming will be interesting enough to make it worth paying attention to...
Certainly should be an interesting couple of months...
BTW... it hasn't been said explicitly... so, it's probably worth the effort in saying it...
This is a BRANDING war, not just a tech competition...
And that is the context in which the NOK cash horde has to be valued...
The $6 billion NOK has looks pretty good as a stand-alone, it you ignore the trends.
However, it's not a standalone. The trends do matter... and so does the competitive CONTEXT... which is the SAME issue I've been pointing out as "in error" in the articles comparing "numbers" shipped while ignoring the impact of those numbers on the competitive position of the one posting them...
So, NOK has a "war chest" of $6 billion... and a "make or break" opportunity to crack the market in a way that will change people's minds... and that depends on how they deploy that cash... and whether the use they make of it "fits" the actual requirement the environment imposes... in a way that allows them to win the day...
So, NOK has $6 billion, after considering their debt... while competitor AAPL has no debt, and here's the lines from Yahoo showing their cash position and other competitive considerations:
| Qtrly Revenue Growth (yoy): | 58.90% | | Gross Profit (ttm): | 43.82B |
Apple isn't the only competitor out there, either, of course...
Meanwhile, MSFT, minus debt... has $50 billion in cash... but, they also have a lot more going on, probably more given they've just announced their first ever LOSS... That's likely to make them more conservative rather than more aggressive... and they will have a lot more to worry about than only the next few months evolution in the cell phone market ? They don't have the exclusive FOCUS on this market that the others do... and they have a long history of DITHERING... then losing money because of it... and not ever appearing like they care.
So, who's most likely to win the "tech" battles is one question. NOK clearly "should" be winning those battles, but, they've allowed AAPL to make bank on NOK developed tech for more than a couple of product cycles... and we're probably a product cycle or two away from having that problem be "fixed"... ??? That's assuming that NOK is able to survive past the current product cycle... which is an open question.
Then, who's most likely to win the "branding" battles is another question...
If you do nothing other than note the degree of inertia that exists... you'd have to give the nod to AAPL just because they're already doing the "branding" thing vastly better... and don't have an uphill battle...
MSFT has hugely significant inertia to overcome in branding... which isn't a new issue...
And, NOK management have been noted, recently, sneaking around lighting fires in the marketing department filing cabinets...
It's not immediately obvious to me that what they've got to wage this battle with... either on the tech front or on the marketing front... gets overly close to meeting the need... |
