Sony Ericsson has appointed Bert Nordberg as the new chief executive to replace Dick Komiyama, who is retiring at the end of the year. Nordberg, who currently heads Ericsson's US technology division, has been tasked with leading the struggling cellphone maker back to profit and increasing its market share, which has fallen below 5 percent. Nordberg plans to focus on increasing market share, restoring profitability, ongoing restructuring, and developing successful products in the next one to two years. Nordberg, 53, who is currently the Executive Vice President at Ericsson and leads the firm's Silicon Valley business, expressed strong confidence in the support from both parent companies and believes that achieving profitability is not far off. Sony CEO Howard Stringer is set to take over as the new board chairman on October 15, replacing Ericsson head Carl-Henric Svanberg, who will assume the chairmanship at BP Plc in January. Analyst Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics believes that these management changes indicate Sony and Ericsson are committed to working together, which will likely be reassuring news for Sony Ericsson's employees and customers. Among the top five cellphone vendors, Sony Ericsson experienced the steepest decline in sales compared to the first quarter. Research firm Gartner reported that Sony Ericsson has failed to keep up with mobile phone trends such as full keyboards, Internet browsing, and navigation, leading to a drop in market share to 4.7 percent globally. Ben Wood, head of research at CCS Insight, noted that the new CEO, Nordberg, faces important decisions in streamlining the company's software strategy and reducing reliance on mid-tier feature phones to improve profitability in a challenging economic climate. Sony Ericsson, known for its music and imaging phones, has struggled to compete in the smartphone market, prompting Nordberg to consider a strategic overhaul of the product portfolio. "In this business, you must have successful products," he stated. Nordberg has been employed at Ericsson since 1996, after previously working for companies such as Data General Corp. and Digital Equipment Corp. Sony Ericsson reported a pretax loss of 283 million euros ($400 million) in July and predicted a challenging remainder of the year, expecting the overall market to decrease by at least 10 percent. "I believe this is due to the need for a fresh start and new talent. Sony Ericsson has also not been performing well in the past year and a half," noted Greger Johansson from Redeye. Ericsson's shares were trading at 66.90 crowns, which was a decrease of 0.5 percent as of 1214 GMT (8:14 a.m. EDT). This outperformed the DJ Stoxx European technology index, which was down 1.7 percent.