Nokia's profit drops like a brick in Q2

The downward trend for Nokia Corp. (NOK) continues. Few companies can sustain a nearly one-third drop in profit for long, but Nokia did just that in the recently closed second quarter, reporting a 31% drop in profit from last year.
A single percentage point gain in income was wiped out by $471 million in write offs resulting in the formation and restructuring of Nokia Siemens Networks and a series of acquisitions including Navteq. As luck would have it, Navteq is the standout division at the firm with a 71% year-over-year increase in net sales. Nokia Siemens Networks reported a 3% year-over-year drop in net sales.
Income from smart phones is up 12%, and a total of 111.1 million device units where shipped during the quarter, representing an 8% increase from the prior year. Income from Nokia’s stable of feature phones and low- to mid-range handsets dropped 4 percent from last year as well.
Mobile device volume in North America dropped 19% while income in that region fell 16%. Meanwhile, net sales of devices and services jumped 31% in Latin America and 21% in Greater China, while they dropped 10% in Middle East and Africa.
“Despite facing continuing competitive challenges, we ended the second quarter with several reasons to be optimistic about our future. For one, the global handset market has continued to grow at a healthy pace, led by some of the less mature markets where Nokia is strong,” CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said in a prepared statement.
Still, there’s no denying the fact that smart phones might be Nokia’s only chance for a resurgence anywhere on par with its glory days. “In smart phones, we continue to renew our portfolio. We believe that the Nokia N8, the first of our Symbian^3 devices, will have a user experience superior to that of any smartphone Nokia has created.”
But will consumers and enterprise find it superior to smart phones from Nokia’s competitors?