CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market

Summary: Nokia is trying its darndest to achieve a comeback in the the U.S. mobile market game, but is it too late?

By Rachel King for Between the Lines | January 10, 2012 -- 03:05 GMT (19:05 PST)

LAS VEGAS -- Nokia unveiled its new Lumia 900 smartphone on Monday, which is basically the company's big attempt to win back consumers in the United States.

It also might be the company's last opportunity -- at least stateside.

The Lumia 900 does have a fighting chance. The specs are top notch, and it is the first 4G LTE phone (set to operate using AT&T's expanding network) running the Windows Phone OS.

But then it became very obvious during Nokia's presentation at CES 2012 that Nokia is riding on the operating system as the major selling point.

It must have been a bit surprising to some attendees that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer would step out and promote the new Nokia handheld merely hours before his own keynote at the trade show.

Certainly, Microsoft is betting big on a Nokia comeback as well, but it always has other partners to rely on, such as Samsung and LG -- both of which are the top two mobile OEMs in the United States as of October 2011, according to comScore.

Of course, there is one glaring problem that might be evident to anyone who follows mobile news. That would be that while Windows Phone 7 is lauded by many for being aesthetically pleasing and fairly well functional inside and out, WP7 overall has not sold very well since its debut in October 2010.

Thus, while this might be the first Nokia device to incite any excitement among U.S. consumers in the last few years, this success or failure of the Lumia 900 could determine the fate of the Finnish phone maker as a major contender in North America (and possibly beyond).

Topics: Mobility, Hardware, Intel, Nokia

Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily email newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.

Talkback

9 comments

Log in or register to join the discussion

RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market

How does the pricing compare to comparable phones?

Unless you are Apple, top specs isn't going to trump value for money. In Europe, that is why Nokia ruled. with the M$ tie-up, I fear they may have forgotten that ;)

Heenan73
10 January, 2012 04:27

Reply Vote
RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market

It is not too late. The mobile space moves very very fast. Android is proof of that, in two years it went from underdog to top dog, it is not far-fetched to think that the same type of thing could happen again. If Nokia covers all price-points like the various hardware manufatures did with Android you could see WP7 rise just as fast as Android. Remember here in the U.S. consumers are on a two-year upgrade cycle.

clcrockett
10 January, 2012 06:21

Reply Vote
- RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market
 
 @ccrockett@... How are they going to cover all price points when the software only supports one core? That's basically a prepaid or entry-level phone in 2012.
 
 symbolset
 10 January, 2012 06:54
 
 Reply Vote
 - RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market
 
 @symbolset Sheesh, last time when I checked an average joe smartphone user never really cared about how many cores a phone has and I think that number of average joes rule over the geeks like us. So having more than one core in a phone is technically moot point. Even at dual core, most of the Android phones lag the smooth scrolling of both iPhone 4 (which is single core btw) and Windows Phone 7 (even the ones running on older version Windows Phone 7). It is not even the User Experiece of a system that decides the sales, it is the carrier representatives and their paid bias.
 
 Ram U
 10 January, 2012 07:42
 
 Reply Vote
 - RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market
 
 @Rama.NET no matter how you slice it Windows mobile Phone 7.x has more overhead than iOS. The iPhone 4 had a 1GHz Arm chip the was down clocked to 800 MHz Windows mobile Phone 7.x couldn???t not run on that without performing worse that your complaints about Android. The iPhone 4s may have dual cores but they re also down clocked( to improve battery life) while to runWmP7.x the best bet is to over-clock the CPU, creating more heat while reducing battery life.
 
 Rick_Kl
 10 January, 2012 12:59
 
 Reply Vote
- RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market
 
 @ccrockett@ lets see iPhone: the phone people lust after, but not everyone can afford. Android: The Windows of the mobile world, not as nice as an iPhone, but a lot of choices, some good, some not so good. Windows mobile phone 7.x: Fanboy phone! Offers nothing the better choices cant do, but combines the worst features of both.
 
 Rick_Kl
 10 January, 2012 13:30
 
 Reply Vote
Mix and Match

Here's why Nokia is hosed in the U.S.: If I'm the Samsung salesman, or the LG salesman, or the HTC salesman, I go to AT&T, Verizon, et.al. and I say, "When computing the discount you get, we count all your handsets, whether they are Android or WP. So, for example, if you sell a million of our handsets next year, you get them at the 'quantity million' price, 62% off list." Nokia only has WP phones to sell, so they can't do that. And since the buyers at the wireless carriers have no idea how well WP will do, and hence no idea what their mix of Android and WP will be, the deals from Asia sound a whole lot better -- and less risky -- than the one from Yurp.

Bottom line: to stay competitive, Nokia has to be willing to sell phones at 'quantity million' prices even when they know they're only going to sell 200,00 or so units. That way lies a huge loss.

Robert Hahn
10 January, 2012 11:56

Reply Vote
- RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market
 
 @Robert Hahn if you look at the last 5 quarters as any type of indicator, the carriers will only order the minimum number of Microsoft Lumia phones, as WmP7.x has not been a spectacular success. When Apple sells more iPhone 4s in one quarter than the total number of WmP7 phones sold in the last 5 quarter, I would not place any bets on the Microsoft Lumia phones being a big hit.
 
 Rick_Kl
 10 January, 2012 13:04
 
 Reply Vote
RE: CES 2012: Nokia relying on Microsoft to get back in U.S. market

Don't count Nokia as out. They are a huge company with worldwide impact. Read their history on Wikipedia....Many have come and gone but they have been around for at least a hundred years with many different products. Tightly held family background.

fastwriter
13 January, 2012 16:34

Reply Vote