Microsoft-Nokia Deal behind the scenes

If you like big and long articles establishes the details behind the scenes of a major deal, the Wall Street Journal has a good on Microsoft-Nokia.

(See also: Microsoft-Nokia: a marriage of mediocrities mobile)

Or should I say, Microsoft-Nokia-Google, because the Finnish mobile device maker was considering a partnership with the search giant (and its popular Android mobile OS) before announcing last Friday that it would begin selling smartphones running Microsoft Windows Phone 7.

Nokia Chief Executive Stephen Elop was negotiating with Microsoft and Google, finally decide on Microsoft (Elop's former employer) after Redmond has agreed to pay billions of dollars to Nokia for development and cost of the phones WP7 marketers over the years.

But Microsoft almost blew up. The WSJ is reporting that after Elop contacted Ballmer, "his former boss and informed him that Nokia had started to assess its strategic options," achieved in negotiations. But Microsoft has had to get all arbitrary:

During this period, talks with Microsoft almost broken, according to a person familiar with the matter. The main problem: Nokia executives believed that Microsoft was dealing with Nokia as would any potential partners laptop, while Nokia was doing a decision "bet-the-company" on a partner software, this person said.

Apparently someone at this juncture that Ballmer reminded a Nokia with Google would have meant the end of Microsoft in smartphone market. Not a company-killer, maybe, but perhaps a job-killer of Ballmer. Microsoft makes a lot of money doing other things, but having a competitive footprint in mobile technology is a priority for any CEO of forward-thinking these days.

So Microsoft launched and began sweetening the deal, arriving a day before Nokia Investor Conference last Friday, which had promised Elop to unveil a new master plan for the company. The Idyll soon convulsed by this humiliation of Twitter:

Although their conversations were supposed to be confidential, Nokia executives were shocked when Vic Gundotra, vice President of Google, February 8, posted a message on his Twitter account that said: # feb11 "two turkeys don't make an eagle," an obvious reference to Nokia investor conference on February 11.

Three days later, the two turkeys were high and proud to announce the partnership nor really wanted, but they both desperately need. It's hard to believe shares of Nokia (NYSE: NOK) have decreased by over 15 percent and shares of Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) down 2 percent since the deal WP7 was unveiled. Investors don't know one when they see an eagle?

Chris Nerney writes about the business side-to-market strategies and technology trends, legal issues, management changes, mergers, venture capital, IPOs and technology stocks. Follow him on Twitter @ ChrisNerney.

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