Nokia revealed to its employees that it plans to accelerate its transformation and increase effectiveness. Nokia's plans will directly result to the laying of an estimated 1, 800 employees globally.

Among these plans are:

  • Nokia will simplify its operations in product creation in Nokia's Symbian Smartphones organization, Nokia's Services organization and certain corporate functions. Nokia's move will expectedly result to laying off 1800 employees globally.
  • Nokia will renew product creation to increase responsiveness to consumer demands and reduce time to market in Symbian Smartphones, by expanding the use of common tools for application development, streamlining software development, simplifying and consolidating operations and placing greater focus on adding value to consumers, among others.
  • Nokia wants to boost its competitiveness and support by building an attractive and sustainable platform for application developers.
  • Nokia's Services organization will now focus on delivering an integrated Ovi experience across thw whole range of devices innstead of distinct end-to-end service lines. The change aims to simplify Nokia's ways of working and to provide more compelling Ovi services to consumers.
  • Nokia is also streamlining certain corporate functions and corporate research activities.

The changes will result to the dislocation of up to 1, 800 employees in its world-wide operation. These 1, 800 employees are the direct casualty of Nokia's plan to discontinue some of its operations and introduction of changes in its organization to be more integrated.

However, Nokia expressed commitment to manage these planned changes to reflect the corporation's values, although it remain unclear just what the statement signifies. It also said that it will support displaced employees with "alternative solutions." However, details to these solutions are yet to be revealed although it cited "find[ing] new positions within [Nokia]" as one of them.

Nokia Executive Vice President (Human Resources) Juha Äkräs: "Changes impacting personnel are always difficult. We are committed to managing these changes in a way that reflect Nokia's values, and will support affected employees with alternative solutions, such as helping them find new positions within the company"

"The announcement is the result of careful evaluation and planning; the plans have now been reviewed and endorsed by the new management. The aim is to accelerate the company's transformation towards a leading mobile solutions provider, and to do this we are simplifying and integrating operations within our product creation and corporate functions."

In a press release, Nokia said it will begin its consultation with employee representatives on its planned changes.