Nokia has just announced its Q3 2013 financial results, revealing an operating profit of €118 million ($162 million) from €5.66 billion ($7.8 billion) revenue. That's up massively year over year, but nonetheless represents another quarter of middling results. The report is the first since Microsoft agreed to purchase Nokia's phone business, and that division — Devices and Services — performed as expected, posting a small loss of €86 million ($118 million).
As a Wall Street Journal report suggested, Nokia's Lumia line performed stronger than ever before. The company set a record of 8.8 million Lumia sales for the quarter, well up from 7.4 million last quarter and massively up from 2.9 million in Q3 2012. North American sales were stronger than expected at 1.4 million. Sales of non-Lumia devices were down year over year, coming in at 55.8 million versus last quarter's 53.7 million and last year's 76.6 million.
If you take Devices and Services out of the equation — which Microsoft intends to do early next year, Nokia was actually more profitable. Phone business aside, its overall revenue was €2.76 billion ($3.8 billion) and it made €204 million ($280 million) in profit. That bodes well for Nokia's phone-less future — with less employees to pay, less research and development costs, the injection of money from the Microsoft acquisition, and strong performance from its other units, it looks as though the Finnish company's financial recovery will only accelerate.
Comments
I’ve been seeing a lot of Lumia’s in the wild these days and they are getting more advertising space from carriers here. I went to Three last week to pick up my 5s and there was a good crowd bunched around the 1020. What ever people say, WP8 is getting traction.
By Nas2k6 on 10.29.13 7:07am
same. I saw someone pull it out and use it at a bar. Needless to say I was pretty shocked. He looked like a businessman though.
By ounkeo on 10.29.13 7:40am
Competition is good, trolls need to get a life.
By partiallypro on 10.29.13 9:30am
Speaking of trolls, I’m guessing this article was HEAVILY modded from excessive trolling
By dmoney01 on 10.29.13 12:24pm
I noticed…I have my popcorn ready!
By CyberAngel on 10.29.13 6:50pm
It is getting traction mostly because of the Nokia brand/innovation/design, etc. Without Nokia it will be sitting at around 0.2% global market share.
Now the interesting part is how is Microsoft planning on keeping the momentum going without the ability to use the Nokia brand ? Most people buy these phones because it says Nokia on the front.. not because they are running WP8
By vlad0 on 10.29.13 11:04am
What people love are the phones, without them the Nokia name would be meaningless to people.
I think the best thing Microsoft can do is run a huge campaign around the Microsoft and Nokia “family” coming together. Ensure the public that those same people who made those great phones are all going over to Microsoft where they will have the resources to make even better devices. Something like that.
While I wouldn’t say the Lumia brand is anywhere near as strong as Nokia, you’d have to think it’s gaining some strength that can keep up the momentum when MS takes over.
By wixostrix on 10.29.13 12:04pm
I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you.
Nokia means very, very much outside the US. Only the US is the one country that Nokia brand can’t really affect. In Europe, switching names from Nokia to Microsoft will have a terrible effect. It’s just because Europeans are really tied to brands they choose. They don’t care what system it runs, they care what brand it is and Nokia is well known to support it’s devices. Tell anything you want, you can’t tell they don’t update software on their devices.
By Kosiek on 10.29.13 2:12pm
The names will stay:
“Lumia” = SmartPhones
“Asha” = Feature Phones (smartphones in China+India)
“Nokia” = Basic Phones
I’m from Europa and I say that it will go on even stronger in the 2014
The Lumia engineers will not stay the same!
They will continue to renew themselves each year!
By CyberAngel on 10.29.13 6:54pm
But since the Lumia and Asha phones won’t carry the Nokia brand anymore (and the featurephones will have the Nokia brand under license) as soon as (or if) the purchase by Microsoft is approved the shareholders and the regulators, that means no more Nokia Pure font in the ads, and the Microsoft design language in the ads and packaging (as well as a Microsoft endorsement at the corner of every ad – except video ads, which will carry a full Microsoft logo, four squares and all, in the end).
By Arthur V.* on 10.29.13 8:47pm
Correct!
By Francesco Gradozzi on 10.29.13 1:27pm
I beleive Microsoft has the ability to use the Nokia brand on its handsets. What I don’t know if that is just for the Asha line, or for all handsets.
By Cormang on 10.29.13 1:33pm
Just the featurephones. Microsoft will own the Lumia and Asha brands outright and the license of the Nokia brand won’t apply for smartphones.
By Arthur V.* on 10.29.13 8:52pm
The more the better. I’m considering a Lumia phone and tablet. But I’m currently a bit worried about the future of these products once Microsoft is done buying that division…
By Bahumbug on 10.29.13 7:10am
Almost 6 days of Android phones in a full quarter? Nice.
By hover10 on 10.29.13 7:10am
Android is a platform with several manufacturers, Nokia is just one manufacturer. I’m not really seeing the point you’re trying to make here.
By stewcelliott on 10.29.13 7:14am
You made the mistake in thinking he was actually trying to make a point.
By onwu on 10.29.13 7:17am
Mr. New Guy you see he is an Old Guy. A Troll Guy.
By Mo.hit on 10.29.13 2:08pm
The point is that they are gaining traction. This quarter its 6 days equivalent, next quarter it will be a bit more, and a bit more, and a bit more. The growth is fairly ‘natural’ too. And there isn’t really much chance that Microsoft will give up, so it becomes a matter of when, not if. When might be 50 years from now, which would be the same as never and ultimately useless, but you get what I mean.
By kidsilver on 10.29.13 7:23am
the trolling is strong in this one.
By DougB541 on 10.29.13 11:47am
Can’t wait for my new device, still on Lumia 900 here.
By Vordy on 10.29.13 7:10am
I am so with you. Been dying to change out my Dell Venue Pro for a Lumia 1020.
Haven’t been paid for 6 months (Oh the joys of living in the third world) and that has seriously thrown my savings out of whack.
C’est la frickin’ vie.
By twreckx on 10.29.13 7:40am
What happened?! What are you into?
#SeriouslyAsking
By Mo.hit on 10.29.13 2:09pm
If u like the Zune media syncing or use playlists for ur music, wait till the Blue 8.1 update for WP8. The music hub still plays the fool with playlists and music in general and is still painfully buggy.
Hopefully by blue they fix the music hub. Until then i have no choice but to use an S3. MY 32gb DVPro died :(
By Veer Maharaj on 10.29.13 3:35pm
What does Nokia do other than ‘Devices and Services’?
By Eric Morgan on 10.29.13 7:31am