Can Nokia make the mobile enterprise manageable at last?

Rethink IT, Dec, 2004

In a major preview of its strategy for 2005, Nokia seems to be giving up the battle with operators in its core midrange handset business, but compensating by chasing a host of new markets where it can attain its accustomed levels of dominance. Key to this is devising technologies and services to take advantage of the burgeoning trend towards mobilizing the enterprise. Nokia's dream is to push the smartphone deeper and deeper into the space occupied by notebooks and Windows PDAs, and create an integrator business based on the infrastructure to surround the client devices, and on vying with Microsoft to set software standards.

Plans outlined at its Capital Markets Day last month sounded, on the one hand, like a statement of repentance for sins against cellcos. Nokia would major on clamshell and fliptop handsets--which it long dismissed in a bid to keep its signature candybar design dominant, despite the demands of carriers; Nokia would work more flexibly with operators to produce phones to their specification, a trend that it has fought tooth and nail in the past, standing up for its own brand and ability to direct development priorities.

CEO Jorma Ollila said that Nokia is in the middle of an 18-24 month transition to come closer to carrier customers, working on customized designs and on software to make it easier for operators to differentiate their offerings. Almost 90% of the 2005 phone line-up will support software customization and 25% will have exclusive operator designs.

It seems that the Finnish giant believes that concessions in these key areas for its largest division, handsets, are necessary to its goal of gaining 40% market share, compared to its current 30%. Such volume levels are essential to the cash, and the investor confidence, that will underpin its more ambitious goals, to expand into new areas of business where it can assert its old control over design and business partner relationships, and where it can increase margins and steal a march on rivals.

SOFTWARE

As we have seen before, these areas focus around high end multimedia devices and enterprise solutions, and driving the software standards agenda with platforms such as Series 60 and the new content framework Preminet.

Nokia committed to making its Series 60 software platform stronger for development of multimedia devices, supporting widescreen, touch screen and pen-based input and push to talk.

"Extending Series 60 will help operators and developers innovate, differentiate their offerings and achieve critical mass quickly in these new markets," said JT Bergqvist, Nokia's general manager for networks. Nokia reports shipments of 15m Series 60 phones to date. This platform, which is licensed by other Symbian OS vendors such as Siemens, is the company's best chance to create de facto standards for high end phones.

Series 60 is important to the multimedia market for advanced consumers and also, with support for various input and browsing mechanisms, to the enterprise. Here, Nokia is seeking to build an ecosystem with strong corporate applications and middleware that will cement its fledgling position with integrators such as IBM Global Services, as an alternative mobile enterprise platform to Microsoft.

MOBILE MANAGEMENT

Critical to the success of a new breed of devices, and any mobile enterprise strategy, is the ability for large companies to manage their newly flexible workforces. This is an area being targeted not just by Nokia but many mobile players, and of course Microsoft.

While the mobile enterprise has been a topic of hot discussion for two years now, this is one aspect of the technology that is falling behind CIO expectations. While devices, operating systems, middleware and even the human resources initiatives to support mobile working are becoming mature, management of the highly dispersed systems remains a major hurdle to successful applications and return on investment in mobility. A cluster of vendors, all with a critical interest in encouraging mobilization of the corporate workforce, are seeking to address this issue before it proves a brake on large company roll-outs--just as previous black spots such as security are close to being erased, Intel, Nokia, Oracle, CapGemini and Sprint head the list, and their various initiatives are designed to increase CIO confidence as much as to address technical short-comings of mobility.

CapGemini, Nokia and Oracle have announced a Managed Mobility Services Collaboration to provide "utility-priced mobility solutions" along with support services such as configuration, security and asset management. The alliance is typical of the type of deals Nokia is seeking as it aims to achieve a pivotal position in the mobile corporation, coming ever closer to companies already entrenched in that market and looking to expand their revenue per site through mobile extensions. The new deal adds CapGemini's consulting strengths to a Nokia-Oracle partnership originally announced in February 2003 and solutions will be showcased at the consultancy's Les Fontaines site in France. The main focus will be on Europe, and on improving security and management of a multitude of devices while on the road.