14 DAY TRIAL // Finnish mobile phone maker Nokia is set to make a huge comeback with the release of their first handsets running under Microsoft's Windows Phone platform later this year, and analysts have already upgraded estimates on the company's performance.
The handset vendor is expected to perform better and better in the coming months, and Nomura Securities reportedly upgraded the vendor from 'reduce' to 'neutral'.
Apparently, the mobile phone maker has had a better-than-expected third quarter of 2011, and should post strong financial results for the fourth segment of the year.
“We are upgrading Nokia to Neutral after raising our estimates to reflect a likely stronger-thanexpected Q3 [third quarter] and solid Q4,” Nomura analyst Stuart Jeffrey said, a recent article on ShareCast reads.
“In addition, we expect new Windows Phone launches to feature at October 26th‘s Nokia World event and that Microsoft supported advertising will build shortly after,” he continued.
Of course, the move to Windows Phone is not completely risk free, the research firm notes. According to them, Nokia did make a bold move when choosing to kill Symbian and adopt Microsoft's mobile platform.
Even so, the new mobile OS might be capable of competing against some other popular platforms out there, at least this is what other analysts already stated.
“We still see a high risk that growth in Windows Phone will not offset declines in Symbian. We believe that Windows Phone might struggle to establish itself at the high end and that a sub-$200 version might take another year or more to develop,” Jeffrey reportedly stated.
Nokia's Windows Phones are expected to become available for purchase starting with November, but their will enjoy only reduced availability during the ongoing year.
Next year, however, the Finnish giant is expected to kick off mass production of Windows Phones and to launch new devices, which should arrive on shelves in more markets around the globe.