In the early 2000s, the Finnish company Nokia conquered the Russian market with the 3310 model. There were also more expensive releases, such as the 8890 slider, but the simple interface of the most popular model and the indestructible case forever left that same handset with a monochrome display in history. In 2017, the brand, resurrected thanks to Microsoft and HMD Global Oy, re-released the iconic model with a camera. However, this is far from the only achievement of Nokia in recent years. We will tell you how a multi-million dollar company survived the collapse and was able to return to service.
Nokia paper
The formation of the brand began in 1865, when the engineer Fredrik Idestam opened a paper mill in Finland. About three decades later, the company ventured into power generation. The name was taken from the location of their second factory near the Nokianvirta River. At that time, three industries decided to unite for one common cause. The Finnish rubber factory, cable factory, and paper factory started working together, but it wasn't until the 1960s that they became one Nokia corporation.
The company mainly focused on four markets: paper, electronics, rubber and cable. They have developed things like toilet paper, bicycle and car tires, rubber shoes, televisions, communication cables, robotics, PCs, and military hardware. In 1979, Nokia entered into a joint venture with Salora, a leading Scandinavian color television manufacturer, to form the radiotelephone company Mobira Oy. A few years later, they launched the world's first international cellular system, dubbed Nordic Mobile Telephone. It connected Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland. It was at that time that the first Mobira Senator car phone appeared, which weighed about 10 kg.
Nokia mobile phones
In the 1990s, the brand became a leader in the production of phones and decided to move only in this direction. In 1991, the world's first GSM call was made by the then Prime Minister of Finland, Harri Holkeri. No wonder he used Nokia equipment. The following year, the first Nokia 1011 mobile phone in Russia was launched. A couple of years later, the company launched its 2100 series of phones. This is the device where the melody was presented. While Nokia planned to sell 400,000 units, the series proved to be a bestseller with 20 million phones sold worldwide.
It was followed by sliders, communicators and the world leader of the 90s - the 6100 model, which already brought us closer to the 3310. The new millennium has become a grand one for Nokia, they have released an insane number of really interesting phones with different configurations and displays. From the cheapest and simplest 1100 to luxury phones like the 7280 "lipstick".
The evolution of Nokia phones
1 of 4
With the release of the first generation iPhone in 2007 and the growing popularity of touchscreen phones, Nokia launched its first smartphone in this segment in 2008. Called 5800 Xpress Music, the Symbian v9 .4 (S60 5th Edition) device was quite successful but failed to compete with Apple. Around that time, the fall of the push-button telephone empire had already begun.
Nokia call
Long before there was a recognizable melody for iPhones and even for Nokia, the Spanish composer Francisco Tarrega wrote a work for Gran Vals solo guitar. This happened back in 1902, and in 1993 the vice-president of the Finnish company chose an excerpt from there and called it Nokia Tune. It was the first cell phone ringtone that sounded from everywhere. And in 2002, with the advent of polyphony, the melody changed. Then there was a version on piano and guitar.
The Nokia N9 in 2011 introduced the new Nokia Tune ringtone, based on bells and chimes, which was present on early Lumia devices. A shortened version was introduced in 2013 on basic phones. A higher variant was available in 2013 on Lumia on Windows Phone 8 and has been used since 2017 on Nokia HMD Global Android phones.
The rebirth of Nokia
The collapse of the company began in the mid-2000s. Then the company had to recall 46 million defective batteries. They were manufactured between 2005 and the end of 2006 and have appeared in many Nokia phones. This meant that the recall affected a large number of devices around the world. Three years later, without getting back on its feet, the company fired most of its employees. Desperate to get out of the ongoing crisis and the inability to compete in the market, Nokia announced a strategic partnership with Microsoft to make the latest Windows Phone its main mobile operating system. The first fruits of the partnership between Nokia and Microsoft were the Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 smartphones, which were announced at the end of 2011.
By that time, the brand had already collaborated with the German optical manufacturer Carl Zeiss. Their work was not created permanently. The first joint device with a high-quality camera was the Nokia N90 back in 2005. The Lumia series also has this optic.
Carl Zeiss collaborates with electronics brands quite often. Among the most famous, besides Nokia, are also Sony. As for glasses, where the Germans also succeeded, I would like to note the clothing brand
The history of Nokia is one of the most incredible business sagas of the 90s of the last century. As BusinessWeek magazine wrote, in the early 90s, the Finnish conglomerate was worried about problems very far from cellular communications: then sales to the Soviet Union that was on the verge of collapse of ... toilet paper began to decline sharply. And by the end of the millennium, the same Finns, reorienting themselves to the production of cell phones, surpassed both Ericsson and Motorola in the new market for themselves. Quite quickly, Nokia became one of the leading players in the global telecommunications market, as well as one of the richest European companies. But everything is in order ...
Came out of the forest
Nokia's history dates back to 1865. On May 12, 1865, the Finnish mining engineer Fredrik Idestam received permission to build a factory for the production of wood pulp near the Nokia River. This was the beginning of the future Nokia Corporation. It was during these years that the rapid growth of the industry occurred. Industrialization, the need for paper and cardboard for growing cities and offices grew every day. And now, on the site of the factory-mill, a pulp and paper mill has grown. Over time, the Nokia plant attracted a large number of workers, so that soon a city of the same name formed around it - Nokia
The enterprise grew out of a national scale, Nokia paper began to be supplied first to Russia, then to England, France, and even China.
In the late 1860s, the demand for paper products in Finland many times exceeded domestic production, which increased the import of raw materials from Russia and Sweden. In February 1871, the Nokia Corporation (Nokia Aktiebolag) was founded. The company confidently conquered the markets of Denmark, Germany, Russia, England, Poland and France. By the way, business people from St. Petersburg played an important role in Nokia's entry into the international arena.
coalition of three
Meanwhile, in the United States, the rubber fever of the early 1830s ended as abruptly as it began. Many investors have lost millions of dollars. But bankrupt Philadelphia hardware manufacturer Charles Goodyear continued to experiment with rubber. In February 1839, he discovered the phenomenon of vulcanization. At the same time, he created waterproof rubber, which made it possible to use this material in a wide variety of conditions. In 1898, Frank Seiberling founded the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company and bought the first factory for it. Ten years later, Goodyear became the world's largest rubber company.
In Finland, rubber products appeared at the end of the 19th century. The first products were shoes and various items made of rubberized fabric. At first they were a luxury, but very quickly raincoats and galoshes gained popularity in cities and rural areas. Rubber products have become an accessory not only to the consumer, but also to the business market. In connection with industrialization, there was a demand for various equipment, which meant the need for all kinds of rubber products. In Finland, the Finnish Rubber Works (FRW) was the main manufacturer of such products. When FRW decided to relocate its operations from Helsinki to the countryside, they settled on a site next to Nokia. The ability to buy inexpensive electricity from Nokia became decisive - the river, near which the plant was located, served not only as an ornament to the landscape, but also was a source of cheap electricity.
In 1912, a company was opened in the center of Helsinki, later called the Finnish Cable Works. The growing need for electricity transmission, as well as the rapid development of telegraph and telephone networks, ensured the rapid growth of the company. Looking ahead, it should be noted that after the end of the Second World War, the company was practically a monopolist that owned the absolute majority of Finnish cable manufacturers.
In 1920, these three firms, Nokia Corporation, Finnish Rubber Works, and Finnish Cable Works, entered into a coalition to form the Nokia Group. depression, and the invasion of the Soviet Union, and subsequent wars, and paying reparations to Moscow.
Although Nokia lost its corporate autonomy, its name very soon became the common foundation for the three firms, and during these same years FRW began to use the name "Nokia" as its brand. However, soon the third of the companies, Finnish Cable Works (FCW), lured Nokia into a new sector for it - the construction of power plants. In the 1920s and 30s, Nokia was already a leader in all areas of its activity. It was diversification that helped the company to almost painlessly survive difficult economic times: when a sector of the economy was in decline, Nokia survived at the expense of enterprises in other industries.
Nokia began operations in the Soviet Union in the 60s. In 1966, the merger of three companies - Nokia, FRW and FRC - began and in 1967 was finalized. Oy Nokia Ab was an industrial conglomerate operating in four main areas: forestry, rubber, cables and electronics. The old lines, especially cables, continued to make Nokia profitable. Some Finnish observers believe that the control system was taken from a cable factory; and the money came from the rubber industry. And the electronics division helped revive Nokia's competitiveness in a new phase of the company's development.
Nokia and mobile communications
Back in the 1960s, Björn Westerlund, president of Finnish Cable Works, established an electronics department that carried out research in the field of semiconductors. The main personnel of the department are employees of universities and colleges, with whom Westerlund has long maintained good relations. The head of the department, Kurt Wikstedt, who called himself “obsessed with numbers”, perfectly imagined all the prospects for the development of electronic communications and skillfully directed the efforts of developers in these priority areas. The moods that were then in the air could be characterized by the words “everything is possible and everything must be tried”.
Nokia, 1960
In 1963, the first radiotelephone was developed, and in 1965, a modem for data transmission. However, most of the telephone exchanges at that time had electromechanical switching devices and no one even thought about the possible “digitalization” of their equipment. Despite such conservatism that reigned then in this area, Nokia still takes on the development of a digital switch based on pulse code modulation (PCM). In 1969, it was the first to produce PCM transmission equipment that met CCITT (International Telegraph and Telephone Advisory Committee) standards. The transition to a digital telecommunications standard became one of the most important strategic decisions for the company, which was confirmed in the early 70s by the release of the DX 200 switch. Equipped at that time with a high-level computer language and Intel microprocessors, it turned out to be so successful that to this day the ideas embedded in it are the basis for the telecommunications infrastructure of the company.
At the same time, new legislation allowed, following the example of Sweden, the installation of mobile phones in cars and their connection to the public network. Since the main strategy of Nokia in the 1980s was the rapid expansion in all directions, the new prospects prompted Nokia to take decisive action. And the result was not long in coming: in 1981, a cellular network was created that covered Sweden and Finland and was called Nordic Mobile Telephony (NMT). Later, it included other countries both in Europe and beyond. The system was based on Nokia technologies. The mobile phone industry began to develop rapidly. Introduced in 1981, NMT became the first widely adopted cellular communication standard.
In 1987, when all mobile phones produced were quite heavy and had large dimensions, Nokia released one of the lightest and most portable mobile phones. This made it possible to win back a significant part of the market.
In connection with the gradual unification of European markets in the late 80s, there was a need to develop a single digital standard for mobile communications, later called GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications).
In 1989, Nokia and two Finnish telecommunications operators formed an alliance to set up the first GSM network. To stay competitive with Telecom Finland, which held a long-standing government-backed long-distance telephony monopoly, analogue mobile service providers Helsinki Telephone Corporation and Tampere Telephone Company formed Radiolinja. The firm bought $50 million worth of infrastructure from Nokia, even though it didn't have a license for the new network.
Jorma Ollila, invited to Nokia by Kari Kairamo, took over the company's mobile phone division in 1990. There was a lot of talk about the new project, everything raised doubts: from the fundamental need for the existence of the network to technological issues. And yet, the Nokia team believed in digital communication and continued their work.
On July 1, 1991, the very first call over a commercial GSM network was made by the Prime Minister of Finland - a Nokia phone. The success of the project impressed the company's board of directors, and Ollila was appointed CEO of Nokia a year later. Jorma Ollila still holds this position and chairmanship today.
Since 1996, telecommunications has become the core business of Nokia. No wonder the Finns took risks. After all, when Nokia invested in GSM, it was a moderately successful company from a small country that challenged an already well-established infrastructure with billions of dollars invested in it and a universally accepted standard. Soon the company concludes agreements to provide GSM networks to 9 more European countries. By August 1997, Nokia was supplying GSM systems to 59 operators in 31 countries.
Number of mobile and landline telephones in Finland 1990-1998
It must be said that by this time Finland was in the grip of the deepest recession in production. And despite the fact that in the 80s Nokia became the third manufacturer of TV sets in Europe, as well as the company's satellite receivers and the division engaged in the production of automobile tires, especially given the consistently high quality of the entire range of products offered, Nokia had to take a risky choice. In May 1992, Jorma Ollila, who headed the company, decides to reduce all other departments and concentrate scientific and production capacities on telecommunications. Today, when Nokia is the world leader in mobile communications and telecommunications, we can appreciate the correctness of this decision.
Success Secrets
It was when the company was seriously engaged in the production of mobile phones and other telecommunications products that it entered the international markets. As a result, in the late 1990s, Nokia became the market leader in digital communications technologies.
In a short time, thanks to its ability to be sensitive to frequent market changes and instantly adopt the latest developments and technologies, the company has achieved worldwide success. It is thanks to a competent and thoughtful approach, as well as the right decisions - both in the field of technology and in the field of management and personnel policy - that Nokia has become a world-class megacompany. For some 6 years, this company has made a leap to world fame.
Jorma Ollila took over Nokia at a time when it needed a breath of fresh air. And the company soon began to grow rapidly. By 1997, Nokia was a manufacturer of mobile phones in almost all major digital standards: GSM 900, GSM 1800, GSM 1900, TDMA, CDMA and Japan Digital. Thanks to such extensive opportunities, the company was able to quickly strengthen its position in Europe and Asia.
Already in 1998, it announced a 70% increase in profits (210 billion euros), while its main competitors Ericsson and Motorola limited themselves to reports of a slowdown in production. Demand for mobile phones continued to grow, and Nokia's market share grew along with it. In 1999, the company won 27% of the mobile phone market, with Motorola, which was in second place, lagging behind by as much as 10%. To date, Nokia is still the leader in the mobile phone market. What explains this rise? Let's try to understand the reasons for this success.
Story. It differed from ordinary Finnish companies not only in the desire for growth and innovation, but also in the effective expansion of the scope of activities. In addition, Nokia distinguished itself by being the only one in its country to pursue a consistent policy of creating a complete self-sustaining chain: from production and development of new products to marketing, brand promotion, sales organization and related services.
Name. First of all, Nokia's management decided that its own brand was needed for successful market penetration - the company was able to foresee that cell phones would soon move into the category of consumer goods (before that, Nokia products were sold under the brands of mobile operators). She managed to solve the task in full measure - today, in the list of the most popular brands, the Nokia brand occupies eleventh place, between Marlboro (10th place) and Mercedes (12th).
Slogan and logo adopted in 1993
Innovation. One of the company's strategic goals has always been continuous innovation, which manifests itself in skillful and constant segmentation, branding and design. Like Procter & Gamble, Nokia periodically released new products in various categories in order to constantly dominate the market. Like Coca-Cola, Nokia gradually became a global brand, only getting there much faster.
Technology. Nokia pays a lot of attention and invests heavily in technology development. The main breakthrough, according to a number of experts, was an advanced and convenient menu system. It was she who, as many believe, gave impetus to the expansion of the functionality of the phone and its gradual transformation is no longer just a communication, but rather an information device.
When many high-tech corporations in the US and Canada focused exclusively on computer information technology, European and Japanese companies are seriously engaged in mobile telecommunications and wireless technologies. And Nokia was at the forefront of these “world changers”. People want to communicate “anytime, anywhere” and Nokia is meeting that demand. Even Americans have recognized that thanks to Nokia, the future of wireless communication belongs to Europe. Indicators such as the proportion of mobile phone owners in the population and the coverage of the territory of cellular communication are much higher in Europe than in the United States. And that's not all: the line between technologies is now blurring - they are merging into a single whole, and mobile telecommunications devices reign at the very center of the wireless information society of the new century.
Design. The hallmark of Nokia phones is considered to be first-class design.
Nokia chief designer Frank Nuovo believes that it is not the new features and intricate device that can bring more success to mobile phones, but ease of use and beautiful appearance. In his opinion, in the minds of people, a mobile phone is something like a watch or sunglasses. They are influenced not by the development of technology, but by fashion. Modern mobile phones of this brand are a milestone that the company's competitors are equal to. Nokia pays great attention to phone design. The company started experimenting with the color of phones ten years ago, when the first color phones came out in Europe and the USA. One of the first was the Nokia 252 Art Edition. In many ways, this is the merit of Ollil and his team, who gave phones from Finland that quality that experts in consumer psychology call paramount in the image of Nokia mobile phones - the ability to give individuality to each of them and thereby stand out from the consumer crowd.
Frank Nuovo's team consists of about 100 designers. The image model series 8000 is an example of first-class design. In this regard, the cooperation between Nokia and Kenzo fashion house is very indicative.
Many believe that the Nokia 8210 is the fruit of a collaboration between Nokia designers and Kenzo fashion house. In fact, this is not entirely true: the Nokia / Kenzo agreement was focused only on promotional activities. For example, the first 8210 was presented at a Kenzo fashion show. Information from the Nokia press release: “ In our business, the Nokia 8210 opens up a whole new class of products, especially when it comes to a new trend in fashion. It is not intended to supplant existing categories, but rather occupies a niche somewhere between a prestigious fashion accessory and a regular phone.
The presentation of the new phone model at the Kenzo fashion show was a new step for us in introducing a new fashion-oriented product category. Kenzo is the ideal partner with a prestigious brand to enter the fashion world.
The mobile telephony industry has already taken the leading position in the world among consumer products of the electronics industry, and therefore the market segmentation is becoming more pronounced. Today, almost every person is a potential user of a mobile phone. Different users have different needs, different lifestyles and individual preferences. For this reason, the concepts of production and marketing are becoming more and more focused on the lifestyle of the client and his ideas about fashion. It can be argued that the mobile phone is becoming an increasingly effective means of expressing individual style and taste. Kenzo, like Nokia, is a style leader.
Kenzo, like Nokia, is a world-renowned brand with global distribution and market coverage. Nokia and Kenzo have similar views on joint activities: the desire for freedom, pronounced individuality, youth style. We have the same idea of style in terms of choice of colors, material and graphic design“.
Corporate culture. I must say that the formation of the well-known corporate culture of Nokia took place even before Jorma Ollila, the current leader, came to the leadership. Many myths have been created about his predecessor, Kari Kairamo. This energetic man has been the CEO of Nokia since 1977. By the way, his predecessor, Björn Westerlund, who was in charge of cable production, practically threatened Nokia's well-being by advocating a reduction in relations with the Soviet Union. Kari Kairamo immediately after his arrival built an important market balance for Nokia: now 50% of products were sent to the USSR, and another 50% to the West. This helped Nokia avoid disaster during a period of major change in our country in the early 1990s. But in 1988, Kari committed suicide and left the company in a very deplorable state. Cairamo was a charismatic leader, sometimes his behavior was cruel, offensive and scandalous. Today's generation of Nokia executives very often receives "advance" precisely because of the image and merits of the company acquired under Cairamo. He also laid down the basic principles of Nokia's corporate culture: teamwork, global scale of activity and continuous professional development.
Jorma Ollila.
No less significant figure was his successor, Jorma Ollila. It was he who in 1991 "brought" Nokia to a new digital standard for mobile communications - GSM. And a year later, when he became the head of the entire company, he promised to make Nokia the largest company focused on the mobile sector of the market. Now no one will argue that Nokia is a business miracle. The basis of everything, probably, was a somewhat unconventional scheme of Nokia's work, involving a combination of freedom of action for its individual structures and strict financial discipline. In other words, the company has certain corporate standards, but outside of them, departments are free to act at their own discretion. However, if any of them has not reached certain financial indicators, and there are no prerequisites for the situation to change in the future, work in this area is curtailed.
Ollila's success in the international financial arena may also have played a role, allowing him to list Nokia shares on the New York Stock Exchange. The much-talked about initial investment in Nokia was actually the result of a rise in its stock price. In five years, Nokia shares have grown by 2300%, and this was the result of a special financial discipline. “If the income from the main business product of the company does not grow by 25% per year,” Jorma believes, “then there is no need to expect growth in the future - you need to change the product and the entire production strategy.”
Despite the openness of information about the company, Jorma Ollila himself remains a mystery to most researchers. He does not seek to flaunt his life. He talks only about technology, management and the prospects of his company. He loves to play tennis, but his playing style is more like fitness training than gambling. Even on the court, he is not inclined to any kind of communication “outside the game”. Ollila is not only stingy with words - he is also frugal with his employees.
The head of Nokia does not litter with people: he is not inclined to fire employees, even when they make serious miscalculations. That's why 60,000 employees of the company are loyal to their boss. “We know the mobile telecommunications industry better than anyone else,” they say. What is self-confidence? Maybe. But Nokia is the leader, and all of us can only agree with this statement. Jorma believes that his policy towards the company's employees is justified: "People who walked together through adversity and defeat to victory must continue to work together." According to the latest data, Jorma Ollila will remain in office until at least 2006.
Present day
GSM technology has given impetus to the emergence of a new type of service - packet transmission of large amounts of data over wireless networks. In 1998, Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola and Psion (a British manufacturer of pocket PCs) formed the Symbian Alliance, a consortium dedicated to developing third-generation wireless technologies. Symbian's strategic goal is to expand data transmission capabilities in mobile networks and integrate these networks with the Internet. The main goal, as Ollila says “to put the Internet into every pocket”, is to provide the Internet to every user of a mobile device.
Nokia in Helsinki, Finland
More than 50,000 skilled professionals create state-of-the-art Nokia mobile phones at the company's 18 facilities in ten countries around the world.
The peculiarity of Nokia is that, developing the next model, it focuses on a specific consumer, providing him with maximum ease of use. Today on the market there are models for people who are actively involved in sports, leading a business or secular lifestyle in the following categories: Basic(2xxx), expression(3xxx), Active(5xxx), classic(6xxx), Fashion(7xxx) and Premium(8xxx). They differ in their respective design and feature set.
Nokia has been in Russia since the spring of 1997, when a Russian local company was created - CJSC NOKIA with its head office in Moscow and a branch in St. Petersburg. The main subdivisions of Nokia were "profile" structures: Nokia Telecommunications and Nokia Mobile Phones. In the fall of 1999, Nokia Telecommunications was renamed Nokia Networks.
Currently, two divisions are actively operating in the Russian market: Nokia Mobile Phones, which promotes Nokia mobile phone models on the Russian market and supports dealers in Russia and the CIS, and Nokia Networks, which provides telecom operators with integrated solutions in the field of infrastructure for mobile and fixed communication networks , personal radio and advanced IP technology.
By 2003, Nokia opened three branded communications stores in Moscow, three in St. Petersburg and one in Chelyabinsk.
More than fifty people work in the Russian branch of the company, among them are specialists in telecommunication technologies and marketing research, engineers and adjusters.
Nokia has been actively working on the Belarusian market since the launch of the first cellular communication network, i.e. for about 10 years now.
Milestones in Nokia's history
1865: The birth of Nokia in the woodworking industry is the emergence of Fredrik Idestam's factory on the Nokia River, southern Finland.
1917: Nokia is part of a coalition of three companies and is expanding into rubber products and electrical cables.
1967: Nokia merges with The Finnish Rubber Works and The Finnish Cable Works. Formation of the Nokia Corporation.
1973: Nokia's most popular rubber boots, the Kontio, are launched in different colors and for all ages.
1975: Computer MikriMikki 3 announced.
1977: Kari H. Kairamo becomes CEO of Nokia Corporation, which marked the transformation of Nokia into an electronics giant.
1979: The birth of Nokia mobile phones.
1981: The birth of Nokia Telecommunications.
1984: Nokia introduces the world's first car NMT phone and starts export deliveries to the Soviet Union.
1986: Nokia introduces NMT cell phone. The Board of Directors divided Nokia Electronics into Nokia Information Systems, Mobile Phones and Nokia Telecommunications.
1987: Nokia introduces the world's first NMT phone that fits in your pocket :). Operators from 13 European countries are signing an agreement on the joint construction and promotion of the GSM network.
1991: The first commercial GSM call was made in Finland using Nokia equipment.
1992: Jorma Ollila became CEO
1992: Nokia introduces the first Nokia 101 portable GSM phone that fits in your hand.
1993: Nokia adopts the "Connecting people" slogan, showing Nokia's contribution to the development of wireless technology.
1994: Nokia becomes the first European manufacturer to supply mobile phones to Japan. The 2100 series appeared. About 20,000,000 of these phones were sold worldwide.
1995: Nokia introduces the smallest base station for mobile GSM/DCS networks, Nokia PrimeSite.
1996: Nokia presents the world's first communicator Nokia 9000.
1997: Nokia shifts its strategic focus to connecting mobile technology and the Internet
1999: Nokia releases the first WAP-enabled model, the Nokia 7110.
2000: Jorma Ollila named Industry Week's Leader of the Year. Nokia 9210 is launched, the first phone with a color screen. Nokia split into Nokia Mobile Phones and Nokia Networks.
2001: Nokia continues its strategic development with the new goal of "Internet in everyone's pocket" and maintaining a leading position in the 21st century.
2002 : 7650 is Nokia's first Series 60 platform phone with built-in camera. The first call was made on a commercial 3G network based on WCDMA. Nokia 6650 announced.
Nokia, which, according to most, is already "dead" and no longer exists, announced that its Here Maps for Android program is out of "beta" status and it can be used freely. In addition, the company announced an Android skin called Z Launcher. It is on it that the company's first Android tablet runs. Thus, it can be argued that the Finns have seriously set their sights on this operating system, having stopped working on Windows Phone.
To understand what is happening with Nokia now, you need to remember what happened in 2013.
Thus, cartography really was and is a serious business for Nokia.
Telecommunications equipment is also one of the key income items. Thus, in the fourth quarter of 2014, the operating profit of the Nokia Solutions and Networks division, which deals with this market, amounted to €470 million. All Russian operators use Nokia equipment to one degree or another, and part of the LTE frequencies in our country is deployed thanks to NSN. This division also has joint ventures with Russian companies, for example, ZAO NPF Mikran.
However, these divisions of the company have existed for a long time. A relatively new structure is Nokia Technology, which is responsible for creating new technologies. This structure is headed by Ramzi Hydamus, who is what the company wants and will license for its brand.
According to him, the ban on the name until the end of 2016 applies only to smartphones.
Otherwise, the company is free to "stick" its brand on any product. In confirmation of this, Nokia Technologies introduced the Nokia N1 tablet, developed jointly with the Chinese Foxconn, one of the long-term partners. Applications for Android are also developed by this division.
Thus, after the sale of Nokia's mobile division, it functions even better than before: financial reports show an extremely positive trend.
The company begins to create new products for itself and at the same time continues to strengthen its existing positions in the market. The release of new devices is an important, but far from the only way for a company to earn money on its brand. So to say that Nokia is no more is fundamentally wrong. You can even expect that after the expiration of the ban on the use of the brand, we will again see Nokia smartphones. But already from another, revived company.
05/18/2016, Wed, 15:11, Moscow time , Text: Sergey Popsulin
Microsoft has agreed to sell its mobile phone business for $350 million. One of the buyers was the young Finnish company HMD Global Oy, which Nokia has already agreed to license its brand for 10 years.
Sale of telephone business
Microsoft announced that it has reached an agreement to sell the handset business it acquired from Nokia to FIH Mobile (a subsidiary of Hon Hai Technology Group) and HMD Global Oy for $350 million. FIH Mobile will acquire Microsoft Mobile Vietnam as part of the deal. Microsoft Mobile Vietnam is a phone manufacturing plant located in Hanoi in Vietnam.
"As part of the deal, Microsoft will transfer all assets related to entry-level mobile phones, including brand names, software and services, a service network and other assets, including partner contacts and key supply contracts," Microsoft said, stressing that we are talking only about simple mobile phones, not smartphones.
After the closing of the transaction, about 4.5 thousand employees will transfer or get the opportunity to work in FIH Mobile or HMD Global.
Microsoft will continue to develop Windows 10 Mobile and support Lumia smartphones such as the Lumia 650, Lumia 950 and Lumia 950XL, as well as phones from OEM partners such as Acer, Alcatel, HP, Trinity and Vaio, the corporation added.
Nokia mobile phones will soon return to the world market
The expected closing date for the transaction is the second half of 2016, subject to regulatory approval and other closing conditions.
Return of Nokia
Today, May 18, 2016, in parallel with Microsoft's announcement of the sale of its telephone business, Nokia announced the licensing of its brand and technologies to HMD Global Oy. Under the signed agreement, HMD Global Oy will be able to use the Nokia trademark to sell mobile phones and tablets worldwide for 10 years. At the same time, within three years, HMD Global Oy undertakes to spend $500 million to promote the Nokia brand in the mobile phone and tablet markets.
The Nokia press service did not say that HMD Global Oy would produce smartphones under the Nokia brand. It was only about mobile phones (mobile phones) and tablets (tablets). The word "smartphones" (smartphones) also appeared in the message of the press service. In particular, it was said that HMD Global Oy was also going to release smartphones, but it was not noted that these smartphones would be sold under the Nokia brand.
HMD Global Oy is a newly established private company in Helsinki. It is managed by natives of Nokia. CEO of the company - Arto Nambela(Arto Nummela), one of the former Nokia executives, who currently holds the position of head of the Asian division of Microsoft Mobile Devices. President of HMD Global Oy - Florian Sheikhe(Florian Seiche), currently Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Microsoft Mobile Europe. In the past, he has held senior positions at Nokia and HTC.
Another part of the business
Since Microsoft sold the business to two companies, HMD Global Oy will only own part of it (the share is not specified). The second part will be held by FIH Mobile.
FIH Mobile is a subsidiary of Taiwan's Hon Hai Technology Group, also known as Foxconn. Hon Hai Technology Group is the world's largest contract electronics manufacturer. It manufactures products for many global brands, including Apple, Sony, Google, Microsoft, etc. The iPhone, iPad, Xbox, PlayStation and other popular products leave its conveyors, among other things.
Nokia has already agreed with FIH Mobile on cooperation. All three parties - Nokia, HMD Global Oy and FIH Mobile - have signed an agreement to jointly support the Nokia brand in the global phone and tablet markets. The agreements reached imply that HMD will gain control over sales, marketing and distribution of Nokia-branded mobile devices. In turn, FIH will provide manufacturing facilities, access to parts manufacturers and the design department.
Sale of mobile business of Nokia
In September 2013, Microsoft's Nokia mobile business for 5.4 billion euros. The parties agreed that Microsoft will be able to use the Finnish brand for 10 years from the date of signing the agreement. Nokia has pledged not to license its brand to other vendors until December 2015 and not to release mobile phones (including smartphones) under the Nokia brand.
Today we will talk about the iconic transnational company Nokia. Nokia is one of the few companies that has changed direction more than once and, having huge ups and equally huge downs, continued its activities. Today the company is known to many thanks to the production of mobile phones, communicators, Nokia Here mapping service.
So, Nokia was founded in 1865 engineer Frederik Idestam and Leopold Mechelin in Finland.
Initially, the company was engaged in the production of wood pulp near the Nokia River. This time is known for rapid industrial growth, the need for cellulose products grew day by day. The company began to actively develop and attract more and more workforce. As a result, the export of paper products was established far beyond the borders of Finland: Russia, England, France.
And already in 1871 Nokia Corporation was founded. The company confidently conquered the markets of Denmark, Germany, Russia, England, Poland and France. The co-founder of the company Leopold Mechelin proposed expanding to include the production of electricity and cables, but this idea was not liked by its founder Idestam, who left the company in 1896. Mechelin managed to promote his idea to the shareholders, and by 1902, one of the activities of the company was the production of electricity. Also, by the middle of the 19th century, the technology of vulcanization was mastered, which made it possible to use rubber in various spheres of life. In Finland, rubber was produced by the Finnish Rubber Works (FRW). When the management of this company decided to move production, they chose the land next to Nokia, because. could buy electricity from them at low prices.
The rapid development of industry meant the need for the production of cables for power transmission, telegraph and telephone networks. As a result Finnish Cable Works was founded in 1912.
In 1920, the Nokia Corporation, the Finnish Rubber Works and the Finnish Cable Works formed a coalition agreement to form the Nokia Group. It turned out that three different companies used the same name - Nokia. Such an “alliance” played into the hands of all three firms, because together they formed an almost closed chain of energy production and transmission (by the 1920s, Nokia was engaged in the production of power plants). It was this diversification that helped to overcome the difficult situation of the post-war crisis that roamed around the world.
The company is engaged in various production, creating at some time paper products, automobile and bicycle tires, shoes, various cables, televisions and other household appliances, personal computers, electric generators, robotics, capacitors, military communications and equipment (such as the Sanomalaite M / 90 cipher text communicator and gas mask M61 for the Finnish army), plastic, aluminum and chemicals.
In 1966, three enterprises began and in 1967 were finally formalized - Nokia, FRW and FRC. Oy Nokia Ab was an industrial, worked in four main areas: the timber industry, the production of rubber, cables and electronic equipment. The old lines, especially cables, continued to make Nokia profitable. Some Finnish observers believe that the control system was taken from a cable factory; and brought the rubber industry. And the electronics division helped revive Nokia's competitiveness in a new phase of the company's development.
Together with Salora, Nokia begins work on high-frequency broadcasting technologies. As a result, the ARP communication standard was isolated. In the mid-1970s, one of Nokia's first telecommunications products, the DX200 switch for automatic telephone exchanges, was released.
In 1984, after buying back part of the shares of the joint company Mobira, Nokia releases one of the first portable phones - Mobira Talkman. The device consisted of two parts: a transmitter and a speaking tube, and its weight was almost 5 kilograms.
And in 1987, thanks to technological progress, the company presents Nokia Cityman, a mobile phone with a single block of hardware hardware. By the way, the weight has dropped to 750 grams)))
In 1992, the company launched the world's first GSM phone - Nokia 1011.
In the same year, the famous Connecting People slogan was used for the first time.
At the moment, Nokia is the largest company in Finland by capitalization - 30 billion dollars. The company is the largest employer in Finland, with a total staff of about 100,000 people. Since September 2010, the post of CEO has been occupied by Stephen Elop, during which the transition of smartphones to Windows Phone and the further sale of the mobile division took place. And the market share of smartphones fell from 29% in 2010 to 3% in 2012. He also cut his staff by 20,000 people and received more than $25 million after the approval of the deal with Microsoft and later took a job in this company.
It is worth noting that the decline in popularity was outlined even before the arrival of Elop to the position of CEO.
It turns out that his actions only worsened the already poor state of the company, because. Samsung, LG and Apple began to enter the market.
As for the financial side, the company reported to the public for its own activities in the fourth quarter of last year and for 2013 as a whole. As expected, the numbers are quite depressing. Thus, the operating in the fourth quarter fell by 17% and amounted to €274 million, and revenue - by 21% (€3.476 billion). At the same time, it amounted to €12.709 million, which is also 17% lower than in 2012. As we remember, the mobile division was sold and listed as "operations". It is reported that sales of Lumia for a three-month period decreased from 8.8 million units to 8.2 million, and in total since its inception (2011), Nokia has sold about 44 million Windows Phone devices (which is approximately as much as Apple sold in 2011). the same quarter or the sum of the Samsung Galaxy S4 since March 2013).
However, the other three “pillars” on which Nokia is based continue to make a profit. In particular, Nokia Solutions and Networks reports revenue of €3.105 billion (€2.592 billion in the third quarter) and operating income of €243 million (€166 million). Mapping service HERE generated 20% higher revenue for finances than in the third quarter, reaching €254 on an operating income of €18 million. As for Advanced Technologies (research division), it earned €310 million in a year, which is slightly lower than a year earlier , but Nokia managed to gain a strategic advantage by extending cooperation with Samsung regarding the use of "Finnish" patents, for which royalties began on January 1, 2014. Well, Nokia has drawn a line under its phone business. In a year, new financial results will tell how justified such a decision of the board will be, which caused a huge public outcry in Finland and beyond.
And in November 2014, the announcement of the Nokia N1 tablet took place. It is worth noting that the company has issued a license to use the brand to the Chinese company Foxconn. Those. from Nokia there is only a brand and proprietary Z Launcher, built on the Android 5 platform. The tablet turned out to be successful, of course, the design is rather suspiciously similar to the iPad Mini, but that's where all the similarities end. Tablet got a gorgeous 2048 × 1536 display, a 64-bit Intel Atom processor and a starting price tag of $ 250, which is the best price / quality ratio in this segment. The release of the Tablet is scheduled for 2015.
Nokia also conducts research in the study of graphene (an allotropic modification of carbon). The material itself is 300 times stronger than steel, it is almost transparent, has tensile strength and much more. Nokia has received $1.35 billion from the European Union (UE) to research and develop this ultra-strong material over the next ten years. And there are already results. The Nokia Battery 300 is a carbon battery that, in contact with water, generates protons and recharges itself. 30% humidity is enough to charge the battery.
We can also mention the progress in the development of flexible (rather than curved) displays, which use mechanical deformation for various kinds of functions. So far, these are raw prototypes, but there is no doubt that they will find their way into the near future.
In conclusion, I would like to say that given that Nokia has changed its focus every time, depending on the wishes of the market (and did it quite successfully), I would not be surprised at the company's success in the field of graphene and other mobile solutions.
Thank you for your attention))
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