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Nokia reports €1.3b operating loss for Q1 2012, sells half as many smartphones as last year

Nokia reports €1.3b operating loss for Q1 2012, sells half as many smartphones as last year

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Nokia's Q1 2012 financial report has just been posted, noting an operating loss of €1.3 billion that led to a net loss of €590 million for the period.

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Nokia Lumia Windows Phone_1020
Nokia Lumia Windows Phone_1020

Nokia's Q1 2012 financial report has just been posted, noting an operating loss of €1.3 billion that led to a net loss of €590 million for the period. The company did warn us that it wouldn't be able to maintain its earlier forecast of breaking even, and now we know the full extent of the damage. In total, Nokia sold 11.9 million smart devices during Q1, which is less than half of the 24.9 million it achieved in the first three months of 2011. This has been put down to the rapid decline in Symbian handset sales, which Nokia says have been "partially offset by growing sales of Nokia Lumia devices." Nokia sold two million Lumia smartphones in the quarter.

Operating losses from the Smart Devices and Services division alone amounted to €219 million, equivalent to a -5.2 percent operating margin. That compares to much more buoyant numbers of €729 million and 10.3 percent, respectively, during the same period last year, a time when Nokia was still relying on Symbian as its main OS while preparing to make the move to Windows Phone.

"We have strong liquidity and a strong capital structure, which will help us move through this transition."

This is an understandable period of transition for Nokia, as it seeks to establish its new mobile platform, though it doesn't look like it'll be coming to an end any time soon — the company forecasts Q2 2012 operating margin from its smartphones to be at or below the current loss-making levels.