Nokia CEO Stephen Elop (pictured) has been forced to vigorously deny fresh rumours that the struggling handset giant has struck a deal to sell its handset business to Microsoft, its smartphone OS partner. “There’s absolutely no discussion. The rumours are baseless. It is as clear as that,” Elop told the D9 conference near Los Angeles, reports The Guardian. The rumours appear once again linked to comments from Russian blogger Eldar Murtazin – a long-term Nokia watcher who has previously correctly predicted several big moves at the handset giant. Murtazin claimed last month that Microsoft had struck a deal to but Nokia’s handset business and raised the subject again following Nokia’s latest profits warning on Tuesday. Nokia’s share price slumped to a 13-year low this week but they rebounded slightly yesterday on the speculation Microsoft could buy the business for as little as US$19 billion (US$30 billion was the figure cited last month).

Nokia struck a deal with Microsoft in February to use the software giant’s Windows Phone OS, phasing out its Symbian platform in the process. “My principal focus and the focus of the team is to take care of the short term but make sure that the execution is flawless”, Elop said at the conference. As an ex-Microsoft employee, Elop was also forced to deny allegations that he had been planted at Nokia by Microsoft last September as a ‘trojan horse’ to prepare the company for a takeover. According to the Financial Times, Nokia was valued at EUR17.79 billion at the close of trading yesterday.