Where Nokia heading?
If someone asks me which is the most powerful company in the technology world,I would put Nokia on the top of my list along with Microsoft,Google and Intel.These companies have achieved truly global scale and have an enormous impact on our daily lives.
Well,what's really interesting to me is Nokia's transition from pure Hardware vendor to Application and web services company.Today 40 out of 100 mobile phones are Nokia's and the company already sold more than 1.5 billion phones over the years.That number is greater than no.of Windows PCs and automobiles in the world.Nokia selling more cameras,MP3 players than any other specialist company.They may even outsell specialist GPS companies soonly.Despite all this Nokia have to abide by devils called 'Operators'.But in the recent times the company increasingly realizing the importance of consumer experience and application development.Its recent acquisitions Navquest,Avvenu,Trolltech and the launch of music portal called 'OVI' suggests that company is well on the collision course with operators.As Nokia makes these devices PC centric they will be on collision with Microsoft,Google as well.Nokia can take leaf out of Apple's book,which went through great transition from hardware vendor to hardware+software+services company.
Nokia aspiring big and its very much clear that the company is heading towards becoming web services company.Nokia's choice of application development platform will decide whether it can attract developers or not.The company already owns vested ownership in Symbian and its S60 is the dominant development platform.Trolltech acquisition is little confusing and probably suggests that Nokia will jump on Mobile Linux band wagon.Nokia using Debian based Linux (Maemo)on its N800 internet tablets which is based on GTK+ and Trolltech brings rival development platform Qt.It remains to be seen how Nokia will justify this move.There are consortiums like LiPS,Motorola's LIMO,Google's OHA,CELF,Intel's Moblin and Montavista's Mobile Linux to standardise the Mobile Linux and to stop the fragmentation.Nokia's success depends how it will ditch operators and attract developers to its platform to redefine consumer experiences on tiny screens.
