Nokia announced its quarterly report for Q1 2008, missing analysts’ profit expectations and predicting an overall slowing of the worldwide handset market. Before 1-time charges, the world’s largest handset maker said its earnings per share rose, as expected, to 61 cents from 41 cents year-over-year. However, after including 1-time costs, earnings were only 51 cents per share.
Nokia also said it now expects the handset market to fall during 2008, though sales in emerging markets will continue to lift shipments by as much as 10%. In a statement, the company said that its changed outlook “primarily reflects the negative impact of the recently weakened U.S. dollar, the general economic slowdown in the United States and possibly going forward some economic slowdown in Europe.”
In response to the news, Martin Garner, mobile director at research consultancy Ovum, wrote: “This is the first set of results reported by Nokia under its new reporting structure, so it is not simple to do a direct comparison on all aspects. It is a very healthy set of results, underlining the strength of Nokia‘s phone portfolio and its market position in most areas.”
The handset maker said it sold 115.5 million handsets during the quarter, and estimated its market share at 39%, slightly below analysts’ expectations of 39.7%.
