Nokia Lumia Sales Go Up, Symbian Sales Decline

Nokia’s earnings report for the first quarter of 2013 has come up with unexpected results. In spite of the extensive popularity of Lumia smartphones, the company has reasons to be worried. Its feature phones sales declined by almost 25% as customers seem to be moving on to smartphones, especially Android based phones which are available at cheaper prices today. The Lumia series performed reasonably well by selling 5.6 million units and managed growth of 27% over the quarter.

Lumia’s strong presence improved the Finnish company’s financial position by helping it overcome a revenue slump. Being high margin phones, Nokia benefitted from their inherent profitability for the second time in a row (compared to feature phones). The latest Q1 results did not included the sales of the Lumia 520 and 720 as they were launched towards the end of the quarter. With the enthusiastic response that the phones received, Nokia should be hoping for better results in the next quarter.

Despite good overall sales, Nokia seems to have lost out in the emerging markets. The company’s sales in China declined by more than half in one year. This will be a major disappointment as the country’s smartphone market is expanding rapidly and more users are shifting to 3G every day. With many alternative smartphones available at almost the same rates, Symbian phones are losing out on popularity. The company’s situation in the country is not hopeless though, as sales increased by almost 20% with the help of the Lumia 920, 820 and 620.

Nokia’s financial story followed the same pattern as last year when Nokia’s sales dropped by over 25%. The company managed to gain some momentum introducing a new line of Asha full-touch smartphones that gave tough competition to unsatisfactory low end Android smartphones. Similarly, this year Asha will be going for an update and the trend may repeat. Last year, Windows Phone was yet to have any meaningful interest and Symbian sales were fast declining. This year, the former has managed to make a mark in the market though Symbian is on the verge of extinction.

Nokia’s sales of 5.6 million units of Lumia series phones in the first quarter is almost thrice the number it sold in the same quarter last year. The company’s overall net cash position has also improved by about 120 million Euros, mainly because of the Nokia-Siemens Network which showed operating profit margins of 7% compared to loss margins of 5% last year.