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Comment by pavlov | Hacker News Reader

Essentially this means that Nokia won't get back into consumer hardware for a good while. The mapping division (Here) will probably be sold soon.

The mobile networks business is now the primary driver at the company. They'll have their hands full trying to integrate the Alcatel-Lucent networks business with their existing assets. (Remember that Nokia's networks business today is already the result of a merger with Siemens and a purchase of Motorola's networks division, so they have some experience with that.)

Nokia is now a formidable competitor to Ericsson and Huawei, but it won't be on Samsung's or Apple's radar again.

I know that Nokia does license the Nokia brand to Foxconn for Android tablets sold in the Chinese market... But that's not a sign of life in Nokia's consumer ambitions any more than it is for other brand licensors like Kodak or Polaroid.

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Nokia also designed the hardware and wrote the software for the N1, so i wouldn't call it a traditional brand licensing thing a la Kodak/Polaroid.

I should know, I was PM on it.

I am glad to see Nokia still making strides in any/all areas they can, i love their phones, still do but dont own one for obvious reasons,

I still have my Lumia Icon (Windows platform) and it still out specs most smartphones. It was a solid phone, and I only switched back to Android because of the lack app support from Android and iOS developers.

With more developers starting to port their apps to the Windows platform, I'm considering going back to it.

Just as a comparison:

Display Pixel Density Lumia Icon: 441 Google Nexus 6 (new): 493

Camera Lumia Icon: 20MB Google Nexus 6 (new): 13MB

Processor: Lumia Icon: Quad core, 2200 MHz, Krait 400 Google Nexus 6 (new): Quad core, 2700 MHz, Krait 450

System Memory: Lumia Icon: 2048 MB RAM Google Nexus 6 (new): 3072 MB RAM

Keep in mind the Lumia was released in February 2014, The Nexus 6 was in November of 2015

The marketing and launch for the product was very weird if this is the case. Why was it emphasized that it's a brand licensing deal? I think being so loud about it certainly diminished the value of the product. If Nokia designed the product, hardware and software, how is it different from the typical model (Apple etc.)? Is it because the 'producing' and money for the product came from the Chinese? I.e. the Chinese took the investment risk.

It was emphasized as such to shareholders because they are rightly concerned that having just essentially exited the market for consumer electronics, the company should not go re-entering the market exactly as before. And so you have this arrangement with a manufacturing partner which greatly reduces the risks Nokia assumes in re-entering the consumer market.

I just hope whoever buys HERE doesn't screw it up. At the moment I do like them more than the google maps. They are also cheaper when it comes to licenses.

I think Samsung will pick up Here. Seems like a bargain for them.

Samsung has been slowly building up their own "shadow stack" for mobile. They have everything from the OS up, but map data is a huge missing piece.

Also, I think Samsung's homegrown Tizen OS has some ambitions on the automobile side, and that's a market where Here has been doing well.

I've heard rumours Samsung is already using HERE heavily internally. So it would make sense- but what will happen to the other that are currently using it to (they've mentioned Microsoft, BMW etc. in the article).

Worst company name ever.

Nokia Maps has almost always been better than Google Maps, it's just not well known. Nokia bought Navteq back in '07 I believe, and I used to use Nokia Maps on my N95, which had A-GPS for fast lock (new tech for GPS-enabled phones back then). People were floored that a phone could find POIs/food and do quality navigation. This was all pre-iPhone too.

Even now the current HERE Maps allows you to cache full countries for offline traveling and a bunch of other small features that add-up to leaving GM in the dust. Full offline caching has saved me in a number of situations. If Apple Maps wanted to compete with GM, they should buy HERE... and rename it to something better. It's been renamed about 4 times over the last 8 years.

> Nokia is now a formidable competitor to Ericsson and Huawei, but it won't be on Samsung's or Apple's radar again.

Ericsson maybe, but Huawei is a juggernaut that leaves them in the dust (massive growth both in terms of revenue and innovation, especially in emerging markets) .Alcatel-Lucent was really struggling throughout its existence.

Huawei is generally #2 in market share, no?

For carrier networks, yes, but that changed in 2014. See this : http://www.telecomlead.com/telecom-equipment/huawei-revenue-...

You neglect that Samsung is also a huge player in the mobile networks equipment business.

I thought that they signaled that decision by splitting the company and selling the phones to Microsoft?

Nokia's buying of AL probably means that they won't have to license the brand to Foxconn in order to make hardware. (The N1 is a pretty good tablet though.)

Also worth noting is that AL ows a pretty big pool of patents, so I'm not sure what was Nokia's main motivation.

ALU doesn't produce handsets anymore. Alcatel sold their handset business to TCL a while ago, and TCL has the rights to the brand for handsets. So even if the Alcatel name will disappear on the network side, it's likely to remain on handsets but it's just a brand for TCL.

They are better off not selling handsets anymore. Even Samsung and Apple will start to feel massive pressure on their margins sometime soon. Handset technology is leveling off and generic manufacturers are getting better at making them. It is much like what had happen to HDTVs recently. Sure there is "the ecosystem", but with Android the white box manufacturers get that for free too.

So yes Nokia squandered a huge lead in handset tech, but getting rid of the division has helped them a lot

I dunno about Apple, Unless Huawei or similar manages to grab the media attention in the same way but at a quarter of the price.

Hell, Samsung basically had to go on a marketing blitz to get where they are right now.

Xiaomi seems to be taking the right steps to get there.

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