Nokia looks to Microsoft veteran to turn the tide

Published on Thursday 9 September 2010 23:13

TELECOMS giant Nokia has hired Microsoft high-flyer Stephen Elop to replace its embattled chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo and renew its drive to compete with Apple.

Elop, 46, has risen rapidly over the past five years from chief executive of San Francisco web software maker Macromedia to head of Microsoft's business division, responsible for its Office software package.

He will be the first non-Finnish executive to run the company which has seen its market value halve in the past four years.

Investors and analysts had urged Nokia to bring in an outsider to help the company regain a reputation for innovation it has largely lost to Apple's iPhone and a host of other models built around Google's Android software.

Nokia chairman Jorma Ollila, who led Nokia's transformation from a rubber boots-to-TVs conglomerate into a mobile-phone giant in the 1990s, said he would also resign as soon as possible after the transition.

At a news conference yesterday, Elop, a Canadian, said it was too early to say what he planned to change at the company which has performed particularly weakly in the US market in recent years. He said: "My job is to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our customers."