While Nokia's decision to make Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 its primary platform for smartphones is aimed at reviving its flagging handset business and compete better with aggressive rivals such as Samsung and Apple, it also means loss of job for many engineers working on the Symbian platform.
In India too, some Nokia engineers could lose jobs as part of a global restructuring. The handset-maker employs around 2,500 engineers in its Bangalore centre.
"Many Symbian projects are shifting back to Finland from Bangalore. The company might give us some new projects," said a Symbian engineer in Bangalore, concerned about the uncertainty. He requested anonymity.
Globally, the company has said it is looking for alternative employment for workers who will lose their jobs at the Finnish mobile manufacturer due to its strategic shift.
The company is already facing backlash from Symbian developer community worldwide, on forums, blogs, tweets. Symbian is one of the most used mobile phone operating system in the world, having an installed base of over 200 million phones.
At Nokia's own forum, developers feel cheated, due to the shifting strategy of Nokia - first from Symbian, to Meego, a Linux based operating system for phones, to Maemo, and now Windows Phone 7.
"We want MeeGo and Qt," says a developer on blogs.forum.nokia. Other said: "Farewell to freedom and openness." Qt is an open source framework for developing mobile phone apps across platforms, largely used by Symbian developers.
Nokia's new strategy entails sourcing operating systems for mobile phones from Microsoft, instead of developing it in-house. Nokia employs about 6,500 people in its R&D setup, out of which about 40% are in India. "About 50% are in the software research and development while the rest are in hardware division. But none of the jobs are expected to be affected in India. Support for Symbian phones would continue and we expect to sell 150 million more Symbian phones this year," said a Nokia India spokeswoman.
Under pressure from trade unions, Nokia issued a statement from its headquarters in Helsinki last week. "We will together look for new opportunities for employment for all these people who will possibly be affected," said Nokia spokeswoman Henna Pelkola. Nokia's statement came after pressure from a Finnish trade union, which has 100,000 members. It may also demand that Nokia Corp pay 100,000 to each employee it lays off as part of its strategy overhaul.
A Bangalore based engineer at Nokia said, "The step to slowly move away from Symbian may destroy consumer confidence but at the same time change is required in any industry or software. If the consumers are ready to accept the change that would be a great success," he said.
Analysts say that new entrants Apple and Google have already shifted the market over the past few years in their favour. "Customers will question the flow of innovative applications on Windows Phone 7 devices. Nokia will have to reduce its margins on these devices in order to drive sales," says Ian Fogg, principal analyst, Forrester Research.
For Nokia smartphone users, the handshake between Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and his ex-employee and current Nokia CEO Stephen Elop may mean a shrinking of the Symbian mobile app market place. The developer community might stop making newer applications for Symbian platform, it being a temporary platform. Android and Apple's iOS are already very popular.
Another challenge before Nokia would be to convince developers hooked on to the open source QT platform, to Microsoft's relatively closed Windows Phone 7 operating system.
Mahesh Uppal, director at Com First India, said, "Symbian as well as Nokia are losing market share to Android. The bad news is for Symbian. For Nokia this is a gamble."
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