Microsoft pushes former Nokia director Stephen Elop aside – update

Microsoft shoves former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop aside and transfers the division he led to the branch of the organization that develops Windows. The resignation is part of a reorganization within the top of the Redmond company.

The reorganization at the top of the company follows a major layoff last year, in which thousands of employees lost their jobs. Microsoft announces the departure of Elop and two other top people itself. In addition, Mark Penn, the marketing manager responsible for the Scroogled advertising campaign, with which Microsoft aimed at Google.

Elop was a longtime CEO at Microsoft. He led the Office division before moving to Nokia in 2010. As director he took the decision there to stop the development of the operating systems Symbian and MeeGo and to focus everything on Microsoft’s mobile operating system Windows Phone.

Elop was in the running to succeed Steve Ballmer as director of Microsoft, but in the end the choice fell on Satya Nadella. Elop has been in charge of Microsoft’s Surface and Lumia divisions since Microsoft took over Nokia’s phone business last year, but that division is now merging with the Windows division led by Terry Myerson.

After the reorganization, Microsoft still consists of three major divisions. Windows and Devices, Cloud and Enterprise, and Applications and Services. The top executives of the other divisions, Elop, Kirill Tatarinov and Eric Rudder, will leave at some point, but exactly when that will be, Microsoft has not announced.

Update, 18:07: Jo Harlow, who heads Microsoft’s smartphone development and also comes from Nokia, is also leaving the company, The Verge reports. Microsoft has confirmed this information.