After Microsoft’s $8.5 billion purchase of Internet calling corporation Skype, there’s a buzz that Microsoft perhaps is in negotiations to obtain Nokia’s mobile phone branch.
Gossip is gossip and so should not be paid serious attention. Nonetheless, this scrupulous rumour has been attractive due to its source, Russian blogger Eldar Murtazin. Murtazin – accounted to have concrete Nokia sources – revealed the Nokia-Windows Phone anecdote and, lately shared the information that Nokia will end its OVI product.
“Next week Nokia will start the negotiations about the sale of it’s phone unit to Microsoft,” stated Murtazin in the post (as translated from Russian). “For now the results of the negotiations won’t be public, but the deal might close before the end of 2011. Both companies are in a big hurry.”
A Nokia PR spokesperson replied to the rumour on twitter today, although he didn’t reject the story completely.
“We normally don’t comment on rumours as you know, but we have to say that Eldar’s rumours are obviously getting less accurate with every passing moment,” said Mark Squires, UK communication director for Nokia on twitter.
In recent times, the two corporations confirmed a contract to make the Windows Phone 7 operating system the main system on Nokia devices, so why does Microsoft feel the need to obtain the handset branch and turn into a hardware manufacturer?
Microsoft can propose to own the complete mobile company (both hardware and software), instead of simply selling Windows Phone licenses to corporations like Nokia, which leads to huge returns on the sale of the complete device.
GigaOM recommends that the arrangement of Microsoft’s Zune media store, Xbox Live mobile gaming platform, Bing and its mobile Office products could permit the corporation to achieve entire mobile experience, if it obtains a hardware company like Nokia. And, provided the Skype purchase, Microsoft has some attractive opportunities in the way it integrates the Internet calling facilities.
If the stories are accurate, the deal is likely to be enormous – Nokia’s maximum market is $32.8 billion – but isn’t absolutely impossible. Jordan Crook with TechCrunch had a fascinating viewpoint on what Nokia will probably do, if the contract is finalized and accepted.
