History of Nokia

1865-1967 is considered as the Nokia's first century. 1865 is the birth year of Nokia when a mining engineer Fredrick Idestam established a wood pulp paper mill at the Tammerkoski Rapids in south western Finland. After some years he built another mill at the bank of Nokianvirta River named after the name of a dark furry animal locally known as Nokia.

In 1871 Fredrick named his company Nokia Ab. In 1902 this company added electricity generation to its business activities. In 1898 Eduardo polon founds finish rubber works which became nokia's rubber business. Arvid Wickstrom is the founder of Nokia's cable and electronic businesses he, in 1912, started Finnish cable works. The former heavyweight wrestler Verner Weckmen became the president of this Finnish cable works in 1937. In 1960 this Finnish cable works started its first electronic department for selling and operating the computers.

In 1962, it made first in-house electronic device a pulse analyzer for using in nuclear power plant. In the decade of 60s company also started its involvement in telecommunication. For the army and emergency services it launched radio telephones. In 1967 three companies namely Nokia Ab, Finnish cable work and Finnish rubber work, contributed for the rise of Nokia Company.

In the same year these companies merged officially and Nokia Ab was the smallest among these companies. There were five business of Nokia Corporation; rubber, cable, forestry, electronics and power generation. Each business is owned by individual director. Each director had to report their president Bjorn Westerlund.

The Nokia Corporation is responsible for introducing the iconic products in European telecommunication market. This company played a pioneer and remarkable role in the evaluation of mobile market when mobile networks became global. This company led the mobile market by its dominant role.

In 1979, Mobira Oy became the first and early phone maker company. In 1981, Nordic Mobile Telephone (NMT) service was launched. This service was the first international cellular service along with first international roaming service. A rapid rise in the mobile phone market was observed with the launching of this company.

The Mobira 450 was the first car phone introduced by the Nokia Company in 1982 which became portable in 1986. The car phone was heavy, bulky and usually permanently installed in cars. In 1982 it also introduced its first digital telephone Nokia DX200. In 1984, Nokia launched the Mobira talkman portable phone. The first handheld NMT phone was launched in 1987 named as Mobira cityman 900.

The Mobira cityman was less heavy then car phones. Its weight is normally 800 grams. In 1991, the first GSM (Global System for Mobile communication) call is made possible by using Nokia equipment. Nokia is considered to be one of the key developers of the GSM technology. This second generation mobile technology could successfully carry both data and voice tariff.

In 1992, Nokia 1011 was launched, which is the first digital handheld GSM mobile phone. GSM is responsible for high-quality voice calls, text messaging and international roaming. This GSM system had been supplied to round about more than 90 operators all over the world by the end of 1990s. Nokia also enjoys the leading place in introducing the series of handheld portable phones for all major digital standards.

After the successive achievements in mobile market Nokia made a decision to focus on its telecommunication business. In 1992, Jorma Ollila became the president and CEO of the Nokia Company. Now it sold its other two businesses of rubber and cable work and focused on manufacture of mobile phones and telecommunication systems and this became its core business.

In 1994, Nokia launched Nokia 2100 featured with Nokia tune. At that time more then 20 million phone sets were sold worldwide. Francisco Tarrega composed this tune from classical guitar work in 19th century. In the same year, the first satellite call was made by using Nokia GSM handset. In 1997, Nokia 6110 was launched featured with Nokia's snake game. In 1998, Nokia became the world leader in mobile phones.

In 1990, Nokia 7110 was launched introducing the first WAP technology. In 2002, first 3G phone Nokia 6650 was introduced. In 2003, N-Gage was introduced. In 2005, N-series, the new generation of multimedia device was launched. In the same year the rapid and remarkable rise in sale of Nokia phones in mobile market was observed.

Its technologies and expertise in the telecommunication equipment gave it a leading role in mobile market. Jorma Ollila holds the charge as a chairman of Nokia's board and Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo became the president and CEO of Nokia Company in 2006. Nokia, in contribution with siemens, announces the plan for the Nokia Siemens network which commences its operation in 2007.

In the same year Nokia launched its new internet service brand named as Nokia OVI. Nokia is now successfully launching various mobile sets featuring new technologies. Nokia N-series, C-series and E-series brought an electric rise in demand for Nokia sets in mobile market.