The Decline and Fall of Nokia
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 | |
| Author | David J. Cord |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Anders Carpelan |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Company profile |
| Publisher | Schildts & Söderströms |
Publication date | April 2014 |
| Publication place | Finland |
| Media type | Print (hardcover) |
| Pages | 305 |
| ISBN | 978-951-52-3320-2 |
The Decline and Fall of Nokia is a company profile book detailing the collapse of the mobile phone company Nokia. The author is David J. Cord, an American expatriate living in Finland.[1]
The book covers the history of the company Nokia from 2006 to 2013, during the upheaval in the mobile device industry caused by newcomers Apple, Google and low-cost competitors. To a lesser extent it also covers Nokia Solutions and Networks, then a joint venture called Nokia Siemens Networks, during the same period.[2]
The book examines Nokia's decline and relaunch the mobile-phone market, culminating in the sale of its handset division to Microsoft. It attributes the fall to entrenched bureaucracy that stalled decision-making, destructive internal competition, and a failure to recognise the importance of lifestyle devices such as the iPhone. Other factors include Nokia's weakness in North America and a failed shift from hardware to services, exemplified by the Ovi initiative. Rather than a lack of ideas, the book argues, poor middle management prevented innovations from reaching the market.[3]
Cord spreads the blame for Nokia's fall onto former CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, and the company's faulty organisational structure.[1] According to the book, the reason Nokia declined to switch to Android was because Samsung was much stronger and executives were afraid to compete against them in that ecosystem.[4]
The author discusses a theory that skewed decision making during the tenure as CEO of Stephen Elop was due to his conscious desire to do deals specially favorable to his former employer of Microsoft; Cord admits that Elop’s actions appear suspicious, but maintains that they were all logical at the time in the eyes of subordinate Nokia executives who agreed with the decisions [4]
Development
After the completion of the author’s first book in 2012, Mohamed 2.0: Disruption Manifesto, his Finnish publisher asked him to write a book about Nokia. Cord initially declined, because he was working on a novel and thought the time wasn’t right to write about the company. When his novel was completed he began work on The Decline and Fall of Nokia.[1]