10 September 2010: Nokia hires Stephen Elop from Microsoft
Nokia named Stephen Elop, a Microsoft executive, as chief executive, the first non-Finn to lead the company. The world's biggest phone maker was losing ground fast to the iPhone and Android. Elop soon bet Nokia's smartphones on Microsoft's Windows Phone. The bet failed, market share collapsed, and in 2013 Nokia sold its phone business to Microsoft. Being the market leader offers little protection when the market itself changes.
The lesson: Market leadership offers little protection when technology shifts and customers move on.
What it meant for investors
$1,000 in Nokia at the start of 2010 → $385 today, vs $6,071 in the S&P 500.
We start the clock at the start of 2010, the year it happened. That is a loss of $615, while a plain index fund over the same years made $5,071.
What Nokia teaches: Market dominance in a fast-changing technology can disappear within a few years, so a leader's past market share is no protection against a platform shift.
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | $13.00 | $385 | $6,071 |
| 2012 | $4.80 | $1,042 | $5,312 |
| 2015 | $8.00 | $625 | $3,301 |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
What if you bought Nokia? Every starting year and the full story →
More Nokia history
Could you have called it at the time? The wheel picks the year, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick.
Play Sixty-40