Nokia's Shivakumar quits after 8-yr stint

D Shivakumar, who heads Nokia’s businesses in India, West Asia and Africa, has quit after a stint of about eight years with the Finnish handset maker. Shivakumar, currently based in Dubai, had moved to the global role in the second half of 2011, to oversee businesses in almost 90 countries. Prior to this, he was heading Nokia’s India operations. The development comes within a month of BlackBerry India managing director Sunil Dutt quitting early this month. Dutt left BlackBerry at a time when the smartphone maker was trying to make a comeback with its latest device, BlackBerry Z10.

Shivakumar will continue with Nokia till June-end.

According to market sources, Shivakumar, an Indian Institute of Technology-Madras graduate and an alumnus of Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta, has plans to start a new venture on his own, and is unlikely to be associated with businesses such as mobility, telecom and fast-moving consumer goods. Before joining Nokia, Shivakumar was with Philips India and Hindustan Lever.

Commenting on Shivakumar’s resignation, Chris Weber, executive vice-president (sales and marketing), Nokia, said: “Since starting in 2006, Shivakumar has been fully dedicated to the company, playing an integral role in Nokia’s growth in India and beyond.”

Over the past few years, Nokia has been losing its dominance in India and in most other global markets amid tight competition from South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. Nokia, which reportedly had 54 per cent market share in the Indian handset space in 2009, has seen it coming down to about 22 per cent. On the other hand, the high-end smartphone market is dominated by Samsung in India.

India is still the second largest market for Nokia, after China.

During Shivakumar’s tenure, Nokia’s mobility retail touch-points jumped to more than 200,000 from about 35,000.

Besides, the company has successfully built services as a value-added offering to its core business of handsets.