Nokia Banking On Microsoft Phone To Succeed: CEO

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Plan A for Nokia coming back strong in the North American market: Roll out its new line of phones powered by Microsoft's Windows Phone operating system later this year, according to company CEO Stephen Elop.

And plan B?

"Plan B is to make sure that Plan A is very successful," Elop told CNBC Wednesday.

The Nokia executive once again denied rumors of merger talks between his company and Microsoft as "baseless."

What he didn't deny is the company hasn't made much of an inroad in recent years against Apple's operating system and Google's Android.

With February's announcement that it would sell phones using Microsoft software, Nokia is jettisoning its longtime Symbian operating system for phones sold in North America.

"Microsoft hasn’t had a partner that’s been doing its best work for Windows Phone, and that’s the commitment that Nokia has made through this process," Elop went on to say.

He said the market needs a "third, balancing ecosystem" to Apple and Android and Plan A has had strong support from the tech executives he spoke with at Wednesday's All Things Digital conference.

Despite the drop in its stock Wednesday, Elop said investors should hang on because the company is focused "on day-to-day execution as well as implementation of our new strategy" of using Windows Phone.

"The reason to own the Nokia stock today is to recognize that Nokia, in its 146-year history, has repeatedly gone through these patterns of having great success, market conditions change and then we have to change course and execute even better and more strongly than before," he said.