Nokia's 2023 Performance and Licensing Updates
TapTechNews June 3rd news, Nokia recently released its 2023 performance report. The Nokia Technologies department, which is responsible for managing Nokia's patent portfolio, collected a large amount of money from smartphone patent licensing. The relevant department routinely updated patent agreements with more than 50 companies including Apple, Lenovo and Samsung in 2023. Despite a decrease in relevant figures, the department still achieved an annual net sales of approximately 1.3 billion euros (TapTechNews note: currently about 10.231 billion Chinese yuan).
On the HMD Global side, Nokia and HMDGlobalOy (HMD) signed a strategic agreement in 2016, granting HMD the exclusive global license to produce Nokia-branded mobile phones and tablets. According to the agreement, Nokia obtains royalties from the sales of HMD's Nokia-branded mobile phones and tablets for brand and patent licensing.
Since 2020, Nokia has held a 10% stake in HMD company, but relevant financial reports show that in 2023, Nokia recorded a impairment loss of 28 million euros (currently about 220 million Chinese yuan) in the relevant revenue share.
In August 2023, Nokia and HMD modified the licensing agreement so that the exclusive license for HMD to produce Nokia-branded devices will expire in March 2026. And in September 2023, HMD announced plans to shift to a multi-brand strategy. Although it is not currently known whether Nokia will no longer offer any mobile phones with the company's brand to regular consumers by March 2026, we have now seen that HMD has already launched a large number of its own branded mobile phone products.
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