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Nokia CFO Rick Simonson: We want to start acquiring smaller companies

By: , IntoMobile
Monday, May 14th, 2007 at 1:08 PM

When innovation can’t be created in house, it is usually purchased. I have no problem with this attitude, but the question has to be asked:

If you had the mergers and acquisitions checkbook for Nokia, what would you buy?

Let that thought sit inside your head for a moment, I will most certainly expand on this topic later today.

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About The Author

Stefan Constantinescu

Stefan Constantinescu (@WhatTheBit on Twitter) has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices. As a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet, he knows he is not alone with this radical fascination of all things wireless. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you! Stefan began blogging as a hobby in the fall of 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007. Later he got a job at Nokia in March 2008, but as of June 2009 he has rejoined the IntoMobile team. He is currently based out of Helsinki, Finland.

  • Steve Litchfield

    Not along the lines of innovation, but if I were Nokia I’d hire yourself for our marketing team and I’d pump money into sites like AAS, 3-Lib and My-S to ensure they kept going – all are run on (literally) shoestring budgets from month to month and between them do a HUGE amount for Nokia’s profile and sales figures.

    Steve

  • Viipottaja

    The problem could be that directly sponsoring such sites would make them less objective.. Sure, I would certainly pump more money to advertisement on those sites, invite them to events more etc. And it does seem they do appreciate those sites and bloggers nowadays. I mean manufacturing a pink N95 just for Darla Mack.. that’s is just sick..

  • Stefan Constantinescu

    Steve: Thank you very much for the compliment. I completley agree that a strong community makes for a strong brand.

    Viipottaja: Good job on playing devils advocate. Nokia gives bloggers devices all the time however and they have no problem telling the world their thoughts.

  • Viipottaja

    Yes, I know that, and Nokia knows that. But having any presumably independent and critical site effectively paid (i.e. heavily sponsoresd) for by Nokia would seem like a pretty serious conflict of interest situation :)

  • Stefan Constantinescu

    That is the editor’s responsibility, to be unbiased.

    Nokia sponsors Gizmodo, did you know that?

    Did you hear about the PC World writer who left the company because his boss didn’t like an article he published about one of their sponsors (Apple)? He got his job back and his boss (the CEO) got demoted.

    In the end it is up to the editor to decide if that money will corrupt him or not and for the reader to decide to read the content.

    How do you think Engadget gets access to hardware before consumers do? Companies send them stuff.

    Being 100% independent is difficult, but if I was the CFO of Nokia I would make sure people like Rafe and Steve from AAS, Eldar from Mobile-Review and Michael from My-Symbian would be THE FIRST to get products to review.

    Hell I would invite them to a round table discussion and make them sign NDA’s so I could take their feedback and incorporate it into the products that are still a year or two away.

    They have proper integrity and give constructive criticism that is invaluable to Nokia engineers, product managers and designers.

    Being an honest man is hard and that is why there are so few out there today.