Nokia Cuts Jobs As It Ramps Up 5G Investment

Nokia has announced it will cut jobs as it seeks to ramp up investment in 5G technologies and digitalisation.

According to Reuters, the Finnish telecom equipment maker said on Tuesday that it will axed 180 jobs in Finland, from its 6,000 staff in the country.

Nokia of course is no longer a mobile phone player (HMD Global uses the Nokia brand for its phones), but it has interests in other sectors nowadays. Last month for example Nokia temporarily halted legal action against carmaker Daimler as it sought to bring the company into mediation talks over a patent licensing dispute to do with self-driving cars.

5G investment

Reuters reported that on Tuesday Nokia said that its 5G product development in Oulu and elsewhere in the country would be excluded from the 180 job cuts this year.

In 2019 Nokia had reportedly hired around 370 employees in Finland.

The company is competing with the likes of Ericsson and Huawei, as it seeks to persuade mobile operators around the world to use its equipment for 5G networks.

It has had mixed success in this regard.

In the UK for example, three of the biggest mobile operators (EE, Vodafone, and Three) all opted to use Huawei equipment to build their 5G networks.

The only exception to this is O2, which has instead opted to use 5G equipment from Ericsson and Nokia.

Telenor in Norway picked Sweden’s Ericsson as the key technology provider for its fifth-generation (5G) telecoms network in that country.