Nokia has appointed Chris Carr as General Manager of the company's Australian and New Zealand operations, effective 1st January 2011 (see his LinkedIn profile <a target="_blank" href="http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=12900476&authType=NAME_SEAR
Nokia has appointed Chris Carr as General Manager of the company’s Australian and New Zealand operations, effective 1st January 2011 (see his LinkedIn profile here).
Mr Carr, who graduated from Melbourne's RMIT in 1990 with a business and finance degree, said he was keen to "re-establish my connections in Australia".
He takes over the reins from Emile Baak who leaves Nokia Australia after a two and a half year tenure to return to Europe.
In other appointments, Steve Lewis has been named head of sales for Nokia Australia and New Zealand and Greg Clark assumes responsibility as head of retail for Australia and New Zealand.
Steven Lewis returns to Australia after leading Nokia’s marketing organisation in Middle East Africa, based in Dubai. Greg Clark moves over the Tasman from New Zealand where he was responsible for the Vodafone NZ account for Nokia.
Both appointments start immediately and will report to Mr Carr.
As in other territories, the newcomers face a challenging landscape, where Telecom, Vodafone and 2degrees co-op marketing is now heavily centred around handsets from manufacturers like Samsung and Motorola that run on Google's Android mobile software.
Nokia's sliding share in the fast-growing smartphone segment has been blamed for its recent poor financial results.
At Nokia's recent annual result, Telecom Retail chief executive Alan Gourdie said that smartphones now account for 25% of retail sales - a figure he expects to grow to 40% to 50% over the next couple of years.
Telecom has declined to range Nokia's full range of smartphones - and at a time when Telecom is unofficially selling Apple's iPhone.
Like another once Master of the Universe mobile player - BlackBerry-maker RIM - Nokia still has huge market share, but is struggling to adapt to the new landscape.
