Nouvelle Technologie

India could be a jewel in the crown in Microsoft's $7.2-billion buyout of Nokia's devices and services business as Finnish company's relatively healthier operations here and underlying growth potential will make it one of the most-promising market for the US tech giant. While Nokia has been struggling globally, pulled down by the smartphone onslaught of Android and Apple's iPhone, the company is a strong number two in India, though its share has been shrinking. Nokia till recently was the leader in the burgeoning Indian mobile phone market and has a 13.2% market share now in the second quarter of this year. Samsung, which snatched leadership from Nokia, has a 13.8% market share, according to IDC. Experts feel that an encouraging response to the Windows-run Lumia (it has a 5.4% share since its launch in December 2011) and a good share in the low-priced feature phone market (with the Asha series) makes India an attractive market for Microsoft when it

High stakes gamble by Microsoft to enter smartphone space The once mighty Nokia mobile handsets and device business has fallen into the lap of American giant Microsoft at a price tag of $7.17 billion. The announcement, made in the very early hours of Tuesday from Nokia’s headquarters in Helsinki, said that under the deal, Microsoft will pay “Euro 3.79 billion to purchase substantially all of Nokia’s device and service business and Euro 1.65 billion to license Nokia’s patents for a total transaction price of Euro 5.44 billion in cash.” The release emphasised that Microsoft would also get a “long-term patent licensing agreement with Qualcomm, as well as other licensing agreements.” Both Microsoft and Nokia were widely regarded as having missed the boat — Nokia was too late in the smartphone space and Microsoft did not have a device platform for its software business. This deal comes at a time when the mobile handset business is seeing a worldwide carnage.