Nokia CEO (and former Microsoft executive) Stephen Elop has told Reuters that the mobile phone giant has begun work on the first smartphones based on Microsoft’s software.
The tidbit of news comes about a month after the Finland-based company announced the partnership with Microsoft along with a series of management and organizational changes.
Nokia’s chief executive, who transitioned to that role after leaving his position as president of the Microsoft Business Division, also commented on speculation that Microsoft might lodge an attempt to acquire Nokia:
I’m not aware of a strategic interest that Microsoft would have in the rest of the business.
To the extent that a partnership has been formed around what they’re really interested in, then what would an acquisition bring other than a good year of anti-trust investigation, huge turmoil, delays?
Elop said he hopes to produce a Nokia-Windows phone by the end of this year, although we might have to wait until well into 2012 to really start seeing the fruits of their labor.
It better be worth the trouble: Nokia’s decision to dump its software platform in favor of Microsoft’s unproven Windows Phone software already wiped 29 percent off its share price.