
Nokia Tries to Reinvent Itself, Again, by Taking Over Alcatel-Lucent - pavornyoh
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/nokia-tries-to-reinvent-itself-again-by-taking-over-alcatel-lucent/?module=BlogPost-Title&version=Blog%20Main&contentCollection=Mobile&action=Click&pgtype=Blogs&region=Body
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hkmurakami
I had no idea they had sold their mapping unit.

They bought Navteq in 2007 for $8.1B and sold that to automakers in 2015 for
$3.1B [1]. I guess they needed a warchest to have a chance at succeeding in
their turnaround (and considering their manufacturing roots, they'd have a
hard time having a non-manufacturing-centric identity I imagine), but I'm
surprised they couldn't get a higher price tag from a player in the smartphone
market.

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/04/technology/german-
carmaker...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/04/technology/german-carmakers-
buy-nokia-mapping-unit-here.html)

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Aoyagi
Well, from what I heard it wasn't profitable. Amusingly enough, the navigation
in my Cadillac is now maintained by a company owned by the German car makers.

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Nux
That used to mean something, now it means something else. ;-)

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annnnd
I think this is a great deal - for Alcatel Lucent. Hardware networking
equipment is mostly going to become commodity (with SDN). Some networking
equipment will stay expensive, but that will be a smaller market. I don't see
what Nokia sees in this deal...

On the other hand Nokia can still turn things around once they get back the
right to use the name in phones (afaik the name was sold to MS for a limited
period). If they stop inventing new OS every month (and stick to stock
Android) they could be a huge player.

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creshal
Is there really a market for yet another whitebox Android vendor?

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notatoad
No, Nokia just wants to license their brand to some other whitebox Android
vendor. They've got a lot of good western brand recognition that can be
valuable to one of the Chinese oems on the verge of global expansion.

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nabla9
This looks like well executed deal for good reasons.

Nokia and Alcatel-Lucent have little product overlap but significant customer
overlap. This deal produces value for their current and future customers.

Nokia bought Alcatel-Lucent cleanly. It was not merge or fusion. Some managers
are kept, but Nokia is clearly in charge.

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bitwize
For some reason I like the idea of Bell Labs being in the hands of Nokia (not
Microkia).

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dharma1
That's one of the coolest parts of this deal. I hope they make the most of the
incredible research at Bell Labs!

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spinchange
Sadly, Bell Labs really hasn't been the amazing R&D "idea factory" it was
known as throughout the 20th century for at least 30 years or more. Alcatel-
Lucent is many, many, many generations (and iterations) removed from the same
R&D entity that developed the transistor, radar, lasers, communications
satellites, wireless telephony, transatlantic cables, etc., etc.

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danieltillett
Maybe they should go back to making gumboots [1].

1\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia)

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ceduic
They still do, kinda [1]. The footwear business was spun off from the main
company in 1990. [2]

1\. [http://nokianjalkineet.fi/](http://nokianjalkineet.fi/)

2\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokian_Footwear](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokian_Footwear)

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danieltillett
Time to buy it back :)

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ptaipale
With the unrest growing again in Europe, the good old "Nokia Youth Leader"
product line (rubber batons for police) also has a market.

[http://www.naurulokki.com/kuvat/missa-sana-ei-auta-siella-
ta...](http://www.naurulokki.com/kuvat/missa-sana-ei-auta-siella-tarvitaan)
"When words are not enough, you need NOKIA rubber batons"

(a genuine advert from 1920's)

Knowing a lot of guys in Nokia, they are not too happy about the ALU deal
(mostly because of the French connection and experiences) but I see the
business sense.

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aianus
Why don't public companies ever just give up and cash out the stockholders?

It can't imagine what it must feel like to go to work at Blackberry every day
just so you can destroy a little more value :/

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PMan74
I think Nokia have reinvented themselves a few times (they started out in
rubber, right?). If they's opted just to pack it in they would not have become
the giant they did.

In addition I'd assume the major shareholders in Nokia & BB have had sight of
and a say in the plans to try turn things around. And they think that it's a
better bet than simply turning off the lights and distributing whatever cash
those companies have on hand.

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ptaipale
They actually started out as a wood pulp mill (powered by rapids at a river
called Nokia) in 1868. This expanded to a paper factory in 1880 and a
cellulose factory in 1885 and later on a rubber factory, and then a cable
factory, and the telecoms came up as a spin-off of cable manufacturing
(starting with modems).

The pulp mill site looks like this today:
[http://tinyurl.com/nokianvirta](http://tinyurl.com/nokianvirta)

I worked in a Nokia R&D house that was built in Espoo in 1975; it had been
constructed with a 10 tons per square meter load rating in three floors so
that "if this silly electronics thing doesn't take off, we can always bring in
the cable machines."

The name Nokia comes from the name of the river, which in turn supposedly
comes from a reference to "noki" (soot) as it is a pre-historic trading site
of black skins of fur.

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fulafel
Previous discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9379582](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9379582)

