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Nokia’s R&D Budget Waaaaay Bigger Than Competition

By: , IntoMobile
Thursday, February 3rd, 2011 at 8:48 AM
Nokia-R&D

Some research by Bernstein has revealed that Nokia has spent upwards of $3.9 billion on research and development, which is close to three times as much as the average spent by competing mobile manufacturers. Okay, sure, Nokia is still the biggest in the world (for the time being), so it’s not entirely surprising. Samsung was next in line, spending in the neighbourhood of $3 billion, followed by BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion at around $1.7 billion, Motorola and Sony Ericsson at around $1 billion, and Apple and HTC taking up the last two slots.

A lot of Nokia’s money is still going into the recently-reabsorbed Symbian (1.1 billion euros, between the kernel and user experience), with about a quarter of that amount going into their next-generation MeeGo and Qt platform. For as much as Nokia spends on their devices and services, they spend almost as much (2 billion euros) on their infrastructure partnership with Siemens.

For all of the trash talk slung Nokia’s way, they’re still the king of the hill, and have big bucks going behind their next generation of devices. It’s a given that Symbian’s slowly petering out, but I’m really looking forward to how MeeGo will compete in the new mobile landscape. Who knows, maybe we’ll see some of the fruit of this monstrous R&D budget at MWC next week.

[via AllThingsD]

About The Author

Simon Sage

Simon Sage’s education largely surrounded writing, technology and online community, leading him to begin his blogging career at www.BlackBerryCool.com and to quickly discover a vibrant and active community surrounding BlackBerry and mobile technology. In exploring RIM’s platform, he has learned what enterprises are looking for in mobility as well as what makes the innocuous BlackBerry so appealing to them. Recently Simon’s been covering RIM’s gradual move into an already-crowded consumer market, and the impact of burgeoning challengers, such as the iPhone, as well as long-time leaders, like Nokia, on BlackBerry’s advancement. With plenty of content under his belt, Simon will be branching off a bit to see what other smartphone manufacturers are working on while still using BlackBerry as a barometer. At IntoMobile, you can count on his posts being even-handed, well-informed and thought-out.

  • http://twitter.com/cordial david carter

    Isn’t the point that they’ve spent all that money and have nothing to show for it? The US govt spends quite a lot of money you know and they’re insolvent.

    • Recurring Nightmare

      You probably only know Nokia from the TV ads which is hilarious since nobody in the US seems to have any sort of idea what this company is really about. Comparing Nokia’s budget to the US budget only proves my point. Googling Wikipedia link for Nokia would’ve provided you with enough information to withhold your clueless thoughts. Yet, you continue to bark to wrong tree. Way to go, David

    • http://www.intomobile.com/ Simon Sage

      That was the angle at AllThingsD, but Nokia does have something to show for their R&D: they’re the biggest cell phone manufacturer in the world. Their smartphones might not necessarily impress North Americans, but that doesn’t change the fact that they still sell buttloads worldwide.