A group of nine young Nokia shareholders have written an open letter to other shareholders and investors calling for a return to a strategy that ensures control of the software layer of Nokia’s products and the dismissal of CEO Stephen Elop.
On Friday last, Nokia outlined its new strategic direction, including taking on Windows Phone as its primary OS, a major organisational restructure and a focus on getting developing growth markets connected to the internet.
In an open letter, the young investors call for a restructure of the alliance with Microsoft as a tactical exercise focused primarily at the North American market.
They say they want MeeGo to become Nokia’s primary smartphone operating system, as well as the increase in the lifespan of Symbian for at least a further five years.
The letter calls for a developer strategy based on Qt with a primary focus on MeeGo, as well as providing a credible developer story for Symbian.
Call for leadership team shakeup and a new direction for R&D at Nokia
They also call for an end to Nokia’s distributed R&D strategy over multiple locations and time zones and an end to the outsourcing of R&D.
The investors have also called for a leadership team shakeup and urge the aggressive targeting of young software talent from the top universities.
The nine young shareholders, who have worked with Nokia in different capacities in the past, say they plan to challenge Nokia’s strategy and partnership with Microsoft at the next AGM on 3 May 2011.
