Life was simpler in the days before Nokia became the world's largest mobile phone maker, remembers Matti Alahuhta.
If Nokia made better products than the number one, its market share would grow. But after it had overtaken U.S.-based Motorola in the third quarter of 1998, Nokia was left without an obvious target.
"It's very different being a market leader than to be a challenger," said Alahuhta, president of the Finnish company's mobile phone division which generates 80 percent of the company's overall revenues.
The company had to motivate its employees and put new goals in place to avoid the complacency or strategic blunders from which Motorola has suffered.
"We realized this was a sensitive industry. You can gain market share, but it is also very easy to lose share," Alahuhta told Reuters at the company's headquarter in Espoo.
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