Nokia’s (NOK) turnaround isn’t going as smoothly as many had hoped and it now looks as though investors and industry watchers are starting to get restless. The struggling Finnish smartphone vendor has lost more than $1 billion in each of the three most recent quarters. Nokia managed to ship 4 million Lumia smartphones last quarter, but it continued to lose market share as Google’s (GOOG) Android OS and Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone dominated the global market. Investors have been treated to a few unexpected surprises, but some are beginning to lose patience with Nokia CEO Stephen Elop as questions surrounding whether or not Microsoft’s 2-year-old mobile OS will ever manage to make a dent in the smartphone market continue to be raised.
“Elop has not been able to attract customers and that is what counts,” Greenwich Consulting senior partner Magnus Rehle told Reuters. “You can say that he has not had enough time, but he has been there for two years. Time is up.” The news organization noted that Elop only has “a few months” left to prove that Windows Phone can succeed before his future with Nokia is called into question.
“The Christmas season is a lost cause. For Nokia, if there is any chance, it will be Spring,” Danske Invest Finnish Equity Fund analyst Juha Varis added. “The beginning of next year may be the final judgment. I think that maybe the end of the first quarter is the marking point.”
