Nokia cuts jobs to better challenge Apple

by Stevie Smith - Apr 28 2009, 15:40

The recession ploughs on, inflicting yet more indiscriminate damage on leading technology companies with mobile phone titan Nokia Corporation today announcing the loss of more than 350 jobs through its Internet services unit.

With the Espoo-based telecommunications heavyweight expected to cull up to 360 positions, Nokia has indicated that the cuts will see it integrate more services through the new Ovi Store, which it is crafting as a viable challenger against Apple’s App Store.

Other restructuring moves made in light of declining product demand and the company’s first ever Q1 losses, include cost cutting amounting to more than $900 million USD and a significant scale back on investment plans, reports Reuters.

Pinning its hopes on the upcoming Ovi Store, Nokia is hoping the new content service will directly compete, and perhaps even outperform, the App Store, thanks to a potential customer base of 50 million people.

The App Store has less than half of that customer scope after the sale of some 20 million units of its iPhone and iPod Touch handsets – although it has already surpassed one billion downloads in a mere nine months of operation.

The Ovi Store was first announced during the 2009 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February, with Nokia revealing the Ovi application store will be ready for full launch this coming May.

Existing Ovi services available under the Ovi brand umbrella include, Nokia Ovi Suite, Ovi Sync, Nokia Music Store, Nokia Maps, Ovi Mail, Share on Ovi, Files on Ovi, and the recently revamped N-Gage gaming platform.

Beyond the loss of 360 jobs from Nokia’s Internet services unit, the Finnish titan has also announced a further loss of 90 jobs from its internal IT unit and industry collaboration activities.

This latest round of cuts takes Nokia’s recent spate of scythe swinging to around 3,000 job losses.

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