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Nokia acquired by Microsoft

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Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#482

What does this mean for Qt?

What do you expect it to mean? [In March 2011] Nokia announced the sale of Qt's commercial licensing and professional services to Digia [1] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qt_(framework)

Nokia is still one of the primary developers behind Qt, or at least they were... has that changed?

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#483
post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like suggesting that Mercedes Benz have lost already to Ford because they have smaller market share. Which they have, when you're talking about market share. There's some cognitive dissonance going on here- Windows Phone can't succeed because it has a low market share. But Apple succeeds because it has a low market share. Basically, if low market share isn't a problem for Apple, there's no reason why it would…

Apple didn't always have a low market share and built up a huge importance for developers before their share started to slide. There are still millions of iPhones sold every year, even if they're a smaller piece of the overall pie. Contrast to Windows Phone which never had any kind of market share or importance, and has to fight up from absolutely nothing. That's the difference between iPhone's small market share and…

I'd say the difference is that Apple's share, while smaller than Android, is still large. Apple is selling huge quantities of devices and making huge quantities of cash from it. Windows Phone is doing neither.

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#484

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hilarious. How is that river of money working out for HTC, Sony, LG, Motorola ?

Remind me: which company has just been sold for peanuts after trying the WP strategy?

Motorola tried the Android strategy, and got sold for even fewer peanuts.

Specifically, for $12.5 billion, minus $2.4 billion for the set-top box business, minus $3.4 billion in net cash, minus $2.5 billion for tax assets. Actual cost to Google: $4.2 billion.

Compared to Nokia: €5.4 bilion = $7.2 billion.

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its great, Why do I feel 7.2B is very low? The acquisition includes distribution channels around the world, factories, devices, R&D and softwares including google maps replacement Nokia Here, which in my opinion very good too. When we compare this to a software starup Tumblr with 1.2B this seems very less. I could be wrong and missing something big.

Nokia has lots of debt too, which makes It cheaper

> Nokia has lots of debt too, which makes It cheaper

No.

Nokia has a net cash position of about €2 billion. (Was €4 billion before buying out the Siemens half of NSN.)

No debt is being assumed in this deal, and no cash is going along for the ride to Microsoft.

In any case, debt makes a deal more expensive if it is being assumed -- not cheaper. If it stays with the original company, then it has no effect on deal price.

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#486
post #38

This is a great move. There is no money in being an Android vendor except if you're Samsung and are totally vertically integrated. With Windows Phone, Nokia and Microsoft at least have some hope of carving out a profitable stake in the market. Anecdotally, I'm very impressed with some of the new Lumias. I got a 620 to replace my stolen iPhone, and for $200 unlocked its phenomenal phone. The build quality makes a flag…

and for $200 unlocked its phenomenal phone What does this mean? You paid $200 for the phone? You paid $200 to unlock it? What do these phones cost, with contract, without?

He bought a phone for $200, all-in. The phone came unlocked, without a contract. Just put in a SIM and use it on any carrier -- including a prepaid carrier -- with or without a data plan.

The way it works in most of the world.

A more descriptive term might've been "$200 unlocked, off-contract."

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember that no other developed country besides the USA requires that local companies pay local tax again on foreign profits already taxed where they are earned. Most nations recognize that that would make investing locally costly and undesirable. It would also put local companies at a competitive disadvantage worldwide. The politics of government greed in the USA has created a tax system where the USA government ch…

And god forbid you're a US citizen living and working overseas. You still have to fill out US tax forms for both state and federal tax. The federal government won't charge taxes on anything under ~$90,000, but the states sure will expect you to pay your share of their taxes, even though none of that money was earned or spent in the US.

Wouldn't you not be resident in any state in that case then? Or could pretend to just be in a non income tax state?

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people prefer Windows to Mac OS, too, so I really don't see your point.

Not really sure how I can make this point more simply. In order to survive as a niche product you have to offer a significantly better or at least different experience. I'm sitting here right now in a coworking space in Vietnam full of developers. Ratio of MacBooks to PCs is about 15:1, which is pretty typical for any group of technical people I've been around.

I develop on google's CR-48, by using ssh and remoting into linux servers. (trick: use ctrl+alt+o to save buffer in nano in ssh, because ctrl+o launches chrome open file dialog)

The CR-48 has 8-9 hours of battery life.

Also, if someone steals my laptop, I can replace it with this ( https://play.google.com/store/devices/details?id=chromebook_... ) and lose nothing, since the passwords/ip addresses/etc are not stored on the machines, and no code is stored on the machine.

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#489
post #12

~$7 Billion for the device & services business and Nokia's patents. Seems like a good price now, but one you wouldn't have ever predicted before 2007 & the launch of the iPhone. In 2003 Nokia was worth $245 billion[1] [1] http://techcrunch.com/2010/06/22/the-sad-tale-of-nokias-sink...

In 2007 RIM had a market cap of $120 billion.

Disruption is no fun for the disrupted.

Re: Nokia acquired by Microsoft

#490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The car analogy gets trotted out over and over again when talking about smart phone market share but it really doesn't work at all. Smart phone ecosystems have powerful network effects that just don't exist for most luxury goods.

Good point. Which ecosystem seems to be stronger again? It's like mercedes, only mercedes also gets to drive on nicer roads that go more places. When market share translates to usage and developer revenue, as it may some day, this will change. But network effects scarcely reinforce your point.

Every single indicator is trending away from Apple here, from number of app downloads, to overall revenue, to revenue per-app. It's still in Apple's favor, but the gap is narrowing quickly. I've seen a very dramatic change in the attention devs feel they have to give Android even in just the last year.

Maybe this won't continue but if you're skating to where the puck will be then it doesn't look so much like Apple right now.

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