Stephen Elop New Chief Innovator For Australia's Telstra 110
Freshly Exhumed writes: The former Microsoft executive excoriated by some industry watchers for the collapse of Nokia Mobile Phones, Stephen Elop, has re-emerged down under. Telstra says Elop is being appointed to the new role of Group Executive Technology, Innovation and Strategy, "leading Telstra's strategy to become a world class technology company" (stop giggling, you in the back row). Telstra cites Elop's "deep technology experience" and "innate sense of customer expectations."
Sell Sell Sell (Score:1)
Eflop The Destroyer spells DOOM!
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Yeah, I don't know how they got "innate sense of customer expectations." from his time at Nokia.
Maybe he left it off his resume.
Or maybe I don't understand who the customer was.
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His performance at Nokia was brilliant. He delivered the broken carcass to Microsoft exactly as planned. I wonder what they have in store for Telstra?
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To be fair, by most accounts, Nokia was already doing their damnedest to ruin their company before Elop was at the helm. If you look at what they had been doing and were doing when Elop moved in and want to think it was some sort of conspiracy than the conspiracy must have started about three years prior to the event.
That doesn't mean it's not possible, it just means that there were more people involved - thus making it less likely.
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Future Headline (Score:1)
" Microsoft buys Telstra at a steal..."
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I scrolled back up just because I wanted to respond to this.
It got me thinking... You know, I'm unaware of any AUS legislation that would prevent such a merger/purchase. With MSFT wanting to move into the mobile sector more than they already are... The odds of that are low and the odds of success are probably lower - but it might make some sense.
However, if it were Elop *again* to do so, I'm thinking somebody, somewhere, somehow is going to start asking a few questions. That's REALLY going to result in some
RIP Telstra (Score:1)
RIP Telstra
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Exactly. This guy is like the so-called 'turnaround artist' Gil Amelio that just about killed both National Semiconductor and Apple.
I have no idea how these people can continue to fail upwards. Granted, his tenure at Nokia was a "successful failure" as he was an inside man who's sole job was to destroy enough value to make them affordable for Microsoft... but whatever.
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you would think Solomon Dennis Trujillo killed 'em (Score:3)
he had his best shot at taking Telestra down by the lawyers. Telestra seems to be the dumping ground for losers in suits.
Ah good luck with that Telstra. (Score:4, Informative)
Part of a bigger plan? (Score:2)
This is interesting as they have also bought a UK health intelligence company (which wasn't really) called Dr Foster, and also imported the ex-head of the NHS IT and informatics - Tim Kelsey who is an ex-journalist rather than a techie.
I can see why they want to build up non-primary industry services that can be exported.
However
I speak as an Australian when I say that Australia is not very smart about who to hire externally and they tend to go for names rather than capabilities, although these people may be
Is Telstra a MS threat? (Score:1)
Since when did they want them gone?
typo in the summary (Score:4, Funny)
Telstra cites Elop's "deep technology experience" and "innate sense of customer expectations."
That must be a weird typo, it should read "inane sense of customer expectations." instead.
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Re:typo in the summary (Score:5, Funny)
Telstra boasts that "Stephen will immediately add major firepower to our team", meaning that they will all soon be missing their feet.
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No, it means he'll have the power to fire half of the staff.
The good and the bad: (Score:5, Funny)
I have good news and bad news. The good news is we got rid of our Elop problem! The bad news is that we had to sacrifice Australia to do it.
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The good news is we got rid of our Elop problem!
Are you Finnish then?
I am sure he has much more to say on the topic, LOL
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Dear Aussies. Accept our deepest condolences and our heartfelt thanks for taking one for the team.
monkey boy (Score:1)
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It only makes sense if you consider CEOs to be modern royalty, and that companies need to choose someone of a "noble bloodline" to rule them. I can't find any other logical explanation for putting someone as astronomically incompetent as Stephen Elop in charge of anything more than a mop & bucket (not even a gas pump or coffee machine, gas is flammable and coffee burns).
I'd say that this guy is the Hitler of business management, but I don't think that carries the weight it once did, we're too cool with
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Why do you dislike Greenland?
Elop was a great executive (Score:5, Insightful)
He did exactly what he was supposed to do - ruin Nokia as an independent company so that Microsoft could swoop in.
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Problem there is that normally CEO should work for the good of the shareholders of the company.
Of course in retrospect - probably unintentionally - he did so. Nokia got rid of the rapidly decomposing phone manufacturing side that was already dying (due to braindead moves before Elop even arrived), kept the profitable bits and lots of R&D staff (and will get to cherry pick the rest back when MS nukes their phone development). Eventually they'll probably go back to designing phones and letting someone els
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it was still saveable at that point.
it would have meant axing 75% of their os engineers anyways and to cut 95% of os dev subcontracting.
they had like 3000+ staff working on symbian while 100 would have sufficed. another 1000+ on the linux stuff(these are on paper abouts numbers. actual code contributing to customer shipping product people were of course something like 5% of that). you try doing developing like that.. making a customer facing app change might involve 5+ department heads and people working i
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Nokia was dead already, their incompetent board had ensured that by not moving when the clear threat of Android and iOS emerged. At the point Elop joined they really had only two options: take a punt on Windows (which had a chance of working) or slip into certain irrelevance with their own operating system that was too late, or become yet another Android manufacturer.
It's popular to blame the whole thing on Elop, but it was the board of Nokia in the previous years that put the company in the dire situation
Re:Elop was a great executive (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, Elop accelerated the demise by telling everyone that existing Nokia stuff was DOA many many months before they had anything new to ship.
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and it runs Android apps just fine, thank you very much.
Not generally considered a good sign if you have to be 'compatible' with another ecosystem. N808 was still based off Symbian which is almost completely impenetrable to app developers - by the time Meego etc were coming it out it was too late, they were to far behind.
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and it runs Android apps just fine, thank you very much.
Not generally considered a good sign if you have to be 'compatible' with another ecosystem. N808 was still based off Symbian which is almost completely impenetrable to app developers - by the time Meego etc were coming it out it was too late, they were to far behind.
Wasn't N900 doing better than Win phones even with minimal advertising?
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Very good points Jareth. I have said repeatedly, that the Board of Directors ultimately sets the course for the company & it includes the CEO (or Co-CEOs in the case of RIM.)
The BoD was truly the decision maker which refused to react to the January 2007 announcement by Steve Jobs. Had Nokia jumped on board totally at that time, it might have been Nokia rather than Google's Android that was in the top 2 mobile OS's.
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Being yet another Android manufacturer is quite a profitable business if you make quality hardware and have the brand recognition to go with it.
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Two options:
1 - Try Windows.
2 - Insist on Symbian.
3 - Try Android.
I think you need to learn how to count. And how about the fourth option, Meego?
And come on, trying Windows? In which world would it make sense to jump from a failed operating system (Symbian) to another failed operating system (Windows)? If it was an honest attempt, according to your point of you, we must conclude that Elop was not Evil (Tm), just monumentally stupid. And looking at how much money the guy made from the whole debacle, I think
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I think you need to learn how to count.
Oh, you're so fucking clever!
I'm not saying that these things couldn't have ever been successful, but at the point he was brought on iOS was established and Android well on its way to world domination, and at the point Elop joined it was just too late. In theory MS had more resources to throw - in practice they didn't of course, but at the time there were other Windows Phone manufacturers and it was more likely to succeed than Meego, that didn't even exist yet, atleast. They might have survived as an Androi
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I do agree that the situation was bleak when Elop joined; but the question is whether his actions were an honest attempt to save the company or a ploy to destroy its share value and make it easier for Microsoft to buy it.
Ok, honest question then: do you think things could have turned out worse for Nokia than they in fact did? Was there any course of action being realistic advocated that would have made the company even more worthless than it is now?
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Difficult to see how it could have been worse... Atleast they got out with the rest of (non-phone) Nokia surviving and the freedom to manufacture phones again after a short delay, but apart from that it's hard to say how it could have gone worse.
I'm not sure how it could have been much better though, I can't see a good way forward from that position using any of the other options available at the time.
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No disagreement here on the intention and the possible outcome, only the timing. They needed competent management *and* those coders, and to have started sooner.
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I see two big errors on Nokia's part.
1. The lack of CDMA phones.
2. Not developer friendly.
3. No sense of urgency.
The first kept Nokia off of Verizon and Sprint in the US. Verizon at the time was the number one carrier and Sprint number 3. Sure you could be on AT&T but Nokia phones in general were not marketed well in the US. Like it or not the US market is a large and influential market.
The second was simple you had to pay money "and not a little" to develop for Symbian. You just where not going to get
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Nokia had issues a long time before Elop; Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo was a bean counter, not a technology visionary. The Windows Phone gambit at least enabled Nokia to offload the phone business to Microsoft...
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Odd choice (Score:2)
For Stephen, he's gone from CEO of Nokia (massive global brand) to head of a large division at Microsoft (massive Global brand) to kind of "some guy" at Telstra. A company everyone in Australia has heard of, sure - but probably no one else.
For Tesltra, it's like picking a guy who keeps failing (and you can certainly argue for issue outside of his control - but you could argue against that, too). I get there's more to it than this but I have to say, this seems a b
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Seems like odd choices, all round, frankly.
You're talking about a company who's former CEO was a nuclear physicist. Nothing really surprises me anymore.
The lovely game of corporate psychopaths (Score:3)
Jumping from one executive position into the other, no matter what the quality of their work.
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They should have seen if Mehdi Ali was available.
He cant make it much worse (Score:2)
Telstra are already one of the crappiest telcos in Australia (and a company I have as little as possible to do with), I cant see how Elop could make things any worse.
Stockholm syndrome (Score:2)
I know Telstra is about the most expensive internet in the country but I never realised how bad the entry country was until I moved away.
Well I'm sure he'll be no worse than having a nuclear physicist running the place.
Definitely not "COMMUNICATION errors" (Score:2)
There is a clear pattern in Elop's career (Score:1)
Then Microsoft, Redmond, USA
Now Telstra, Melbourne, Australia
His final destination is for sure Amudsen-Scott base [wikipedia.org], Antarctica
Pity poor Telstra (Score:2)
Goat became gardener :-D (Score:1)
Impressions (Score:2)
I think of Australia as the country with the worlds most deadly animals. This seems to fit with that.
Now I see the sexism. (Score:2)
WTF does this turd get something?
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Among other things, Australia's technological achievements include WiFi, which you quite likely used to write your message.
Re:Technology and Australia (Score:4, Informative)
Australia has a long history of innovation and inventions. Some of the ones you may have heard of include:
The black box flight recorder
Spray-on skin for burn victims
The heart pacemaker
Plastic bank notes
The bionic ear
The electric drill
WiFi
The medical ultrasound machine
The cervical cancer vaccine
The boomerang
The hills hoist
The stubby holder
Ugg Boots
The Esky
The Ute
The Victa lawn mower
The wine cask
And that's just some of the things Aussies have invented over the years.
Re:Technology and Australia (Score:4, Insightful)
Trying to pin down THE "inventor" of almost all of those devices is futile. A case in point is who "invented" the airplane - your first hurdle is simply defining "airplane" - and, does it have to be powered? - and piloted? A Greek by the name of Archytas was reputed to have flown a bird-shaped model propelled by a jet of steam for some 200 metres, around 400 BC. Manned gliders were experimented with as early as the 9th century AD. Sir George Cayley was flying glider models that were essentially the full embodiment of the modern conception of airplanes (sans power plants) - in 1803 or 1804. He built a manned glider that flew successfully in 1853. Cayley may have performed powered flight in 1901, though definitive documentation is lacking.
Eyewitness accounts say the New Zealander Richard Pearse took off in his engine-powered monoplane in 1902 or 1903 and flew 300 metres - something (take off under their own power) which the Wrights did NOT accomplish in their first flight at the very end of 1903.
Contemporary reports exist that Gustave Whitehead flew over 2 km in 1901. His craft was not just an airplane, but a flying car. It had two engines driving two propellers, plus a third engine for terrestrial driving. On March 8, 2013, "Jane's All the World's Aircraft" formally recognized this achievement, after years of discrediting.
I did look up the Australian "pacemaker". It was a 1926 machine that had to be plugged into a wall socket. It had one skin pad plus one needle which had to be plunged through the chest wall into the heart. But it did work, and was capable of resuscitating patients from cardiac arrest, after which its use could be terminated. A Canadian produced a fully transcutaneous pacemaker in 1950. It was heavy, plugged into a wall socket, and rather uncomfortable, because of the heavy shocking action, like today's external defibrillators. In 1958 a USAian, Bakken, produced the first wearable external pacemaker, using transcutaneous leads embedded in the heart. Proper implantable pacemakers followed.
I am satisfied to consider that brilliant people of many nations and cultures have all participated in developing and perfecting many useful things.
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and Trumpet Winsock by Peter Tattam from Tasmania, Australia
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Andrew was forced to do it, because nobody else in the world had the same problem. Australia is just that bad.
Here is an old talk from him:
"So the core of rsync is this algorithm that I call the rsync algorithm. And it solves this problem, the remote update problem. Now the remote update problem is basically: you have two computers connected by a very high latency, very low bandwidth link... a typical Internet link, at least if you're in Australia. So, a piece of wet string, a really pathetic link... and yo
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Also called box wine [wikipedia.org].
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I don't know how plastic bank notes helps people survive... nor would I go around bragging "we made uggs!"
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Don't forget the insanely awesome (at the time) Fairlight CMI [wikipedia.org].