Nokia's Microsoft Deal: How Truly Focused is it on Open Source?
by Sam Dean - Aug. 12, 2009Comments (1)- Related Blog Posts
- OStatic Buffer Overflow...
- Is the Symbian Foundation DOA?
- Android: Linux--Only Different
- Has Microsoft Suddenly Awakened to Open Source?
- Remember the Milk for Android Updated
With the announcement of today's deal between Nokia and Microsoft, which will see Microsoft adapt its Office applications for Nokia smartphones, one has to wonder how focused Nokia really is on its execution of plans for an open source Symbian operating system. Symbian remains a dominant smartphone operating system, and the open source version of it is heading into beta testing. Nokia, which is backing the development of the OS, with the help of a huge investment from the European investment bank, retains top market share in the smartphone market, but is displaying increasingly mercurial and questionable decision making with its smartphone strategy.
As GigaOm notes, the pact between Microsoft and Nokia--purportedly aimed at staving off the increases in market share that Research in Motion has seen--"is akin to taking two leftovers from your fridge, popping them on a plate and hoping people find the combination appetizing." Windows Mobile, the traditional platform that businesses interested in Microsoft's mobile Office applications have run, has been increasingly threatened by both RIM and Apple in the smartphone market. While RIM and Apple don't have huge market share among smartphones, they focus on the high end of the market, and their share of the industry's profit margins is large and growing.
According to Gartner's market share data, Nokia maintains 45 percent of the global smartphone market, with the nearest competitor being RIM, with just over 18 percent of the market. However, Nokia's share has been steadily dropping, and representatives from the Symbian foundation and Nokia have been vocal about how the open source version of the Symbian operating system is finally taking shape in a beta version.
With that open source OS finally ready to make its way into the wild, Nokia now thinks a mashup with Microsoft's applications makes sense? The deal is undoubtedly aimed primarily at business users, not consumers, and some businesses are interested in running Microsoft's mobile productivity apps, but it's still a questionable partnership.
Juniper Research expects shipments of smartphones based on open source operating systems to increase from 106 million this year to 223 million by 2014. Android has much momentum in the space, with almost 20 smartphone handsets based on it due by the end of this year. Meanwhile, the open source version of Symbian has been late to the game, even as Symbian officials have maintained that it isn't too late. Nokia, it appears, needs to make more focused and logical bets if it wants to stay dominant in the smartphone market.
