The new logo consists of five different shapes that make up the word NOKIA. The old crest’s distinctive blue has been dropped for a range of colors depending on use.
“There was an association with smartphones and nowadays we are a technology business,” CEO Becca Lundmark told Reuters in an interview.
He was speaking ahead of a business update by the company on the eve of the annual Mobile World Congress (MWC) which opens in Barcelona on Monday and runs through March 2.
After taking over the top job at the struggling Finnish company in 2020, Lundmark has put together a three-phase strategy: reset, accelerate and scale. With the reset phase now complete, Lundmark said the second phase has begun.
While Nokia still aims to grow its service provider business, selling equipment to telecom companies, its main focus is now selling equipment to other companies.
“We had a very good growth of 21% last year in enterprises, which is currently about 8% of our sales, (or) 2 billion euros ($2.11 billion) approximately,” Lundmark said. “We want to double that number as quickly as possible.”
Big tech companies have partnered with telecoms equipment makers like Nokia to sell private 5G networks and gears for automated factories to customers, mostly in the manufacturing sector.
Nokia plans to review the growth trajectory of its various businesses and consider alternatives, including divestment.
“The signal is very clear. We just want to work in businesses where we can see global leadership,” Lundmark said.
Nokia’s move toward automating factories and data centers will also see it partner with big tech companies, such as Microsoft and Amazon.
“There will be several different kinds of situations, and sometimes they will be our partners… sometimes they can be our customers… and I’m sure there will also be situations where they will be competitors.”
The telecoms equipment retail market is under pressure with the macro environment dampening demand from high-margin markets such as North America, being replaced by growth in low-margin India, prompting rival Ericsson to lay off 8,500 employees.
“India is our fastest-growing market and has lower margins – that’s a structural change,” Lundmark said, adding that Nokia expects North America to become stronger in the second half of the year.
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