Microsoft fires another 1,850 former Nokia employees, writes off $950 million

Microsoft bought Nokia's mobile division in 2013 for 5.4 billion euro in cash in an effort to gain prominence in the mobile segment but this turned out to be a costly mistake. Last year Microsoft wrote off $7.6 billion and cut 7,800 jobs and now the software giant lays off another 1,850 jobs and takes a $950 million accounting hit on the value of the assets it bought from Nokia.

The Verge writes Microsoft is streamlining its smartphone business and is keeping just a small number of the former Nokia employees:

We might not ever know the true reasons for Microsoft's Nokia phone business acquisition, but right now it's clear the company has wasted billions of dollars on a failed experiment to try and claw its way back into the mobile market. Microsoft might be preparing a Surface phone, but if it ever debuts it will only cater to the very few who are interested in phone versions of Windows, and it's not going to be enough to reverse Windows Phone's decline. For everyone else, Microsoft's phone making experiment is truly over.