Analysts have told Nokia it needs to speed up its transition to Windows Phone after posting a loss of more than US$1.3 billion.
The results were better than market watchers had feared, prompting a 7% upturn in the company's share price, however declining sales in older Symbian operating system handsets means the move to Microsoft handsets has taken on greater importance.
“The big challenge for Nokia now is that we are seeing a crumbling of demand for Symbian that's in excess of Nokia's predictions and essentially it has to accelerate this transition to Windows Phone and move Windows phones down the line that much faster,” CCS Insight analyst Geoff Blaber said.
“We have one million sales for Lumia and that's a start, but that's all it is at this stage - Microsoft and Nokia have said this is a long term commitment that will require a lot more investment before they are anywhere near the point where they are a proper rival to Apple and Google, but the commitment is there.”
Although sales were down by 21% compared to last year, Nokia was putting on a brave face and talking up sales of more than a million units of its first Windows handsets, the Lumia 710 and 800.
Million Lumias sold
“In the war of ecosystems, clearly there are some strong contenders already on the field and with Lumia we have demonstrated that we belong on the field,” said Nokia CEO Stephen Elop.
“Our specific intent has been to establish a beachhead in this war of ecosystems, and country by country that is what we are now accomplishing. To date, we have sold well over a million Lumia devices. From this beachhead, you will see us push forward with the sales, marketing and successive product introductions necessary to be successful.”
The company said it expected to see sales increase as it introduced Lumia devices to China and Latin America later this year.
This article originally appeared at pcpro.co.uk
