InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

[thelurker]

Nokia “Increasingly Vulnerable” In Smart Phones, Needham Says
Posted by Eric Savitz
Needham analyst Charlie Wolf this afternoon launched coverage of Nokia (NOK) with a Hold rating, asserting that the company is “increasingly vulnerable” to loss of share in the smart phone market.

“Although it has a dominant share in the mobile phone market, Nokia has fallen behind the innovators in the smart phone segment, where software applications and services are defining the winners and losers,” he writes in a research note. “Nokia is invisible in the U.S., is rapidly losing share in Europe and its leading position in emerging markets appears increasingly vulnerable.”

Wolf contends that “Nokia’s problem” is that the Symbian operating system software is a generation behind the iPhone and Android software. “With Nokia’s heritage in low cost, volume manufacturing, not software development, it’s unlikely the company will ever catch up with the companies that are defining the market.”

Wolf expects NOK to earn 95 cents a share in 2010, and $1.06 in 2011.