Nokia launches X30 5G phone and it is why the company failed phones

Except for the tech geeks, most people may have missed the news that there's a new Nokia phone on the market in India. I wonder if the post-iPhone/Android generations even know of a phone brand called Nokia. 

Whether you have heard of Nokia or not, their story is definitely a must-know right now. The story of Nokia's rise, stability, and fall can easily be the story of today's tech giants too. 

The latest: So, Nokia has launched its newest phone in India. It's the X30 5G smartphone in the 'premium' range.

• The Nokia X30 is a standard Snapdragon Android phone with more or less the same features as all Android phones out there. 
• Except there's one distinction; it costs Rs 48,999. This is the 'premium' we were talking about. 

• Oh and it's also very Gen Z in the way that it's an eco-friendly phone, made of 100% recycled aluminum for its frame and 65% recycled plastic. 

So, is it a good phone to buy? Even those who don't talk tech and phones will tell you that it's NOT.

You can check out this comparison. The Nokia X30 is unnecessarily steeply-priced and doesn't really offer any value.  

You must be wondering why a smartphone company would ever release such a product at all and still be in business. Now, that's the story of Nokia. 

It was once THE tech/telecom giant in the world, like better than Apple in terms of market share today, and then lost all of that, came to the edge of bankruptcy, still chose the wrong trend, then came back to release more smartphones and is still in business despite being really bad at the job.

Why did Nokia fail? In a nutshell, Nokia failed because it refused to evolve for years and be on top of what was working for customers. And with its recent X30 launch, it seems like the company has not really learned any lessons. 

The story of Nokia: By the time my parents ever bought me and my brother their first smartphones, it was already the generation of Samsung in India and iPhones for the rich ones. Before the Samsungs, there was a brief period of someone showing off their 'Spice' QWERTY keypad smartphones, and Blackberries (another Nokia story) only for adults.  

But before this period was the time when my parents had the latest Nokia phones in their hands and it was all the rage. I distinctly remember the Nokia N70 with a sliding cover for its camera. Then there was the QWERTY keypad phone too.

• During the time of feature phones or the phones like that in the Matrix movie, Nokia was the world's largest mobile phone brand. 

• By 2005-07, it held 51% of the total global market share. Today, Apple holds the largest market share globally, but it's only 23%. 
• We have all seen the memes about how indestructible Nokia phones are. Like this one:

• This is because Nokia specialised in hardware engineering, in contrast, today's brands are focused on software engineering. 
• It's the reason why Nokia made phone devices shaped like no other. In comparison, today's phones are all the same boring rectangle boxes. 

What happened? Then came Apple with its iPhone and it was a game changer. 

• A year after the first iPhone, the first Android phone was launched. 
• You see, Nokia phones ran on the Symbian OS which was not that flexible for the mobile internet age. 
• Apple had iOS and the brands like Samsung, Huawei, etc jumped on Google's Android and survived. On the other hand, Nokia refused to budge from Symbian and failed. 
• When Nokia realised its mistakes, it thought of correcting itself and chose the wrong option. 
• In 2014, staring at bankruptcy, Nokia sold its mobile business to Microsoft and started making phones with Microsoft OS (most people would remember this part).
• Microsoft phones did not work and they have been discontinued. 

• In 2016, Nokia bought back the phone business from Microsoft and gave the launching rights to HMD Global, which is run by former Nokia executives. 
• This is the Nokia that exists today and runs on - not Symbian or Micorsoft OS, but Android. 
• Nokia's failure to innovate and look at its failing products was reportedly also a result of internal management problems.

Why should we know about Nokia today? Nokia is an example that even if a company is a market leader and there's no way they could be budged from the place, the fall can happen with a lack of innovation and keeping up with the competition. 

So, maybe tomorrow, Google may lose its spot as the biggest search engine if it doesn't come up with the best competition to Microsoft's ChatGPT.  

Also, this author wants Nokia to succeed so that it can bring back the funky phone designs and rid the world of the boring rectangles that can only change colours.