Embattled telecommunications company Nokia has announced it is shedding 4,000 jobs, with a further 3,000 going to its partner Accenture to manage what remains of its Symbian interests.The “realignment” is expected to be completed by next year.
The move comes off the back of financial results for the first quarter of 2011, recording a decline in profits of 1.4% to €344 million. Market share also declines 4% to 29%.
It’s not all bad for the Finnish company, however. Sales of handsets actually rose 1% year-on-year to 108.5 million devices. However, the slow uptake of the flagship N8 smartphone (running the Symbian^ 3 operating system) and poor developer numbers for the Ovi app store has seen its attempts to follow up the N95 (now five years old) fall flat.
Last year, CEO Stephen Elop (pictured) announced a partnership with Microsoft that will see Windows Phone 7 adopted as the operating system of choice for Nokia smartphones. The first devices running the OS are expected to hit the market in early 2012.
The redeployment of Symbian services is a further indication that time is running short for the once dominant operating system. Recent years has seen the platform go open source before a hasty buy-back. Its development has also been running in paralell with MeeGo, a partnership with Intel aimed at smartphones, netbooks and tablets. Nokia abandonned MeeGo in February infavour of the partnership with Microsoft.
Nokia currently employs over 130,000 people globally.
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