Are Lumia phones really growing in Finland?

My Nokia Blog is reporting that Lumia phones are growing in Finland, which I have to disagree.

In short, the claim is based on the statistics from StatCounter. Of course, it makes sense to use that data, in general. But in Finland, which is quite a small country, where Nokia has a significant influence, it might be somehow a different case.

To make a simple example, just check the statistics from Oct. 2010 to Oct. 2011.:

What! Maemo5 / N900 (the 4th biggest OS in the graph) has even a peak of over 5%? Really? And, yes, that's the impact of Nokia in this small country! On the other hand, if you check the statistics in, e.g. France, Germany, UK, etc., there's no change for WP7 phones at all!

Meltemi to be ready this year?

Quoted from the annual report:

Second, lower-priced smartphones put pressure on our higher-end feature phone offering from our Mobile Phones unit. We are addressing this with our planned introductions in 2012 of smarter, competitively priced feature phones with more modern user experiences, including software, services and application experiences. In support of our Mobile Phones business, we also plan to drive third party innovation through working with our partners to engage in building strong, local ecosystems.

So, what could it be? The rumored Meltemi, or the recent bought Smarterphone?

I'll bet it's the rumored Meltemi, a Linux and Qt powered phone. I believe you have seen the progress made in the recent released PR1.2 for N9, right? It's reasonable to believe Nokia is polishing the system, and making it suitable for low-end phones, right?

I know, you're arguing that Elop already said no more MeeGo phones after N9, and yes I know that's quite true. But hey, think about it, what's MeeGo? It's a merged OS between Nokia's Maemo and Intel's Moblin, and for N9 it's still based on Maemo. So, why can't Nokia continue the development, and re-brand it as Meltemi?

Anyway, let's wait and see the fight back of Nokia!

BTW, I guess Nokia will announce the Meltemi phone in Nokia World 2012, held in Helsinki. The time is perfectly matching: one year is enough for the system to go down for low-end phones.

N9 VS Lumia sales numbers in Q4

The analysis is short, but totally based on official sale numbers from Nokia.

In short, Nokia has shipped 19.6 million smart phones (i.e. Symbian, Lumia, and N9) in Q4 2011. Also, Nokia reported that it has shipped "well over 1 million Lumia devices to date" (i.e. till January 26th), so I would say it's quite safe to say Nokia shipped at most 1 million Lumia phones in Q4. Then Nokia shipped 19.6 - 1 = 18.6 million Symbian phones and N9 in Q4. Then in Q3, Nokia shipped 16.8 million Symbian phones.

Back in 2010, Nokia shipped 26.5 million smart phones in Q3, and 28.3 million smart phones in Q4, resulting in an increase of 6.8%. Note that in that quarter, Nokia had only Symbian phones to ship, and it actually had a well sold model of N8, which might have been sold 4 million devices during that time. But now, there's no such well sold Symbian phones in Q4, and there are actually N9 and Lumia phones in different markets.

So, let's play safe, and assume the sales of Symbian phones increased by 5% in Q4 compared to Q3. It means, Nokia shipped 17.64 million Symbian devices in Q4, meaning, N9 has been sold 18.6 - 17.64 = 0.96 million devices!

Definitely, this is the lowest possible sales number for N9. It's up to you to figure out the highest possible sales number for N9!

UPDATED ON January 28th, 2012
OK, OK, I'm adding a simple table to show you more data! In short, it shows how many N9 were shipped in Q4 with different possible Lumia sales number and Q2Q increase of Symbian sales number.

	0%	1%	2%	3%	4%	5%	6%	6.8%
1.0M	1.8M	1.632M	1.464M	1.296M	1.128M	0.96M	0.792M	0.6576M
0.9M	1.9M	1.732M	1.564M	1.396M	1.228M	1.06M	0.892M	0.7576M
0.8M	2.0M	1.832M	1.664M	1.496M	1.328M	1.16M	0.992M	0.8576M
0.7M	2.1M	1.932M	1.764M	1.596M	1.428M	1.26M	1.092M	0.9576M
0.6M	2.2M	2.032M	1.864M	1.696M	1.528M	1.36M	1.192M	1.0576M

The number in read shows you when Lumia sales exceed N9 sales. So, you know who is more demanded, right?

A week, full of news

Well, well, well, it's definitely a week full of news for Nokia! The most exiting news is the great phone N9 started to ship, which is followed by a rumor that we might see some white and green N9 coming in the future as a limited edition. Meanwhile, WJS revealed a secret project, code named Meltemi, targeting low-end feature phones.

More leaks for Nokia's WP7 phones are also surfacing. A new WP7 phone, code named Sabre, was revealed (but removed later) by Microsoft Canada, while Searay was "re-confirmed". The Sabre phone is expected to have Micro SIM and 3.7" screen.

Moreover, some details got leaked through images of some marketing posters that T-Mobile in Germany, suggesting "at least one of Nokia’s Windows Phone devices will include a 3.7″ AMOLED display and inbuilt satellite navigation". Sounds similar to the leaked Sabre, isn't it?

There's also some news from the company itself. Again, Nokia announced some mass reduction and reorganization plan. As many as 3500 employees are impacted, including 2200 in the Cluj factory, Romania, and 1300 doing Location & Commerce business in Bonn, Germany and Malvern, US. Also, more impact will hit the factories in Salo, Finland; Komarom, Hungary; and Reynosa, Mexico next year, where the operations are expected to focus on "customer and market-specific software and sales package customization".

Finally, Nokia has completed the transaction of outsource its Symbian software development to Accenture, with approximately 2300 employees transferred too.

Meltemi to power future Nokia feature phones?

Two days ago, Nokia started to ship it's first (and last) MeeGo phone, the powerful N9. Today, WJS revealed some on-going project inside Nokia, code named Meltemi. According to the source, the Meltemi project is led by Mary McDowell, the executive vice president in charge of mobile phones.

Similar to MeeGo, Meltemi is also Linux-based. However, it's more targeting the low-end feature phones. Sounds interesting, right? And if you follow Nokia closely, you may still remember that when Nokia announced Qt for the next billion, they never explicitly said the next billion meant S40. If we look back to April, when The Register revealed some internal memo, it quotes:

"There will also be opportunities within the Meltemi organization, for personnel working within the MeeGo teams."

Seems we have more to expect!

UPDATE
This is the response of a Nokia spokesman via email:

Of course, we don't comment on future products or technologies. However, I can say that our Mobile Phones team has a number of exciting projects in the works that will help connect the next billion consumers to the Internet.

"Official" now: Nokia WP7 phones code named SeaRay

Now it's "official" that the code name for Nokia's first WP7 phone is "Sea Ray". It looks almost the same as the just announced N9.

UPDATE
Another video for Sea Ray is leaked from possibly a Chinese factory floor.

Meltemi - code name for Nokia WP7 phones

Just read the article from The Register, where some internal memo revealed details of Nokia's cut plan. Among the sad news, it also revealed that Meltemi is the code name for Nokia's WP7 phoes, and the operations will be focused in Oulu, Ulm and Helsinki.