Nokia sales and profits dip in 2nd quarter
The handset maker takes a hit and continues its belt-tightening, but its CEO says that the industrywide slump may be hitting bottom.
Nokia, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, reported Thursday that its second-quarter operating profit fell 71 percent to 427 million euros ($600 million) from 1.47 billion euros during the same quarter a year earlier.
The company also reported that sales fell about 25 percent to 9.9 billion euros in the second quarter. But sales were up 7 percent sequentially from the first quarter of 2008.
Nokia shipped 103.2 million units during the quarter, which was down about 15 percent compared with a year earlier. But shipments were up 11 percent sequentially compared with the first quarter of this year.
And the company reiterated its expectation that the entire mobile market would contract about 10 percent during 2009.
That said, CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said in a statement that the worst may be over.
"Competition remains intense, but demand in the overall mobile device market appears to be bottoming out," he said. "As before, we are continuing to tightly manage our operating expenses."
Nokia said that it increased its market share sequentially for global sales of mobile phones to an estimated 38 percent. And its smartphone market share grew sequentially to 41 percent.
Toward the end of the second quarter, Nokia brought its N97 smartphone to the U.S. market.
The company changed its forecast for the third quarter, and said it expects its third-quarter market share in mobile phones to remain flat sequentially. The company had expected to increase market share in the second half of the year, but now it expects market share to remain flat.