Nokia posts £760m loss as sales plummet

Plummeting sales, including for smartphones, have helped push Nokia to a net loss of €929 million (£760 million) in the first quarter, the firm has announced.

The loss compared with a net profit of 344 million euro (£281 million) a year earlier. Revenue fell 30% to 7.4 billion euro (£6.1 billion) from 10.4 billion euro (£8.5 billion) in 2011, and the company gave a dim outlook warning of stronger than expected competition.

It said operating margins in the second quarter would be "similar to or below the first quarter 2012 level of negative 3%," and that it would speed up a cost cutting goal of one billion euro (820 million) by 2013.

Nokia gave no details except to say it would share "further details as quickly as possible."

Net sales of devices crashed 40% to 4.2 billion euro (£3.44 billion) in the quarter, while smartphone sales fell by more than half to 1.7 billion euro (£1.39 billion).

Nokia said it sold 83 million mobile phones in the quarter, down from 108 million in 2011.

Markets had been expecting a downturn for Nokia, which gave a profit warning last week, and its share price was down slightly at 3.01 euro in early afternoon trading in Helsinki.

Last year, Nokia was still the world's top mobile phone maker with annual unit sales of some 419 million devices.

But in the last quarter of the year it posted a net loss of 1.07 billion euro (£888 million), a marked reverse from the 745 million euro (£609 million) profit a year earlier, as sales slumped 21% with smartphone sales plunging 23%.

AP