HMD Global is now three years in business

Even though the first press release about HMD Global becoming the home of Nokia devices was on 18.05.2016, the starting point is taken 1st of December, 2016. On that date, HMD Global officially entered the market, and a month later Nokia 6 showed up in China. Anyway, three years have passed, and HMD Global is ready to launch the third version of Nokia smartphones. These past three years were rather hard for Finnish startup whose task of bringing Nokia phones isn’t easy. Nokia had a large community that could bring the brand back, but it is a profound community not used to compromises.

HMD had to balance between all the resources Nokia had back then and the financial structure of a modern startup that has a different approach when designing the phone. HMD managed to launch great phones like Nokia 6 (2017), Nokia 7 Plus, Nokia 8.1 and Nokia 8 Sirocco but also showed that it can jump into the toughest category of them all with Nokia 9 PureView. There we saw that financial resources are crucial, and HMD reorganized and focused more on bringing original Nokia content to the people. Nokia 7.2 is a move in that direction but that diamond still needs to be polished. Nokia 8.2 does promise a lot, and we are eagerly waiting for a true flagship.

In the meantime, the experiment with KaiOS and a bit smarter feature phones are doing well. Nokia’s original series is still a great marketing accomplishment that can still raise the hype.
Nokia accessories are slowly becoming available at the important markets, but that important part of the brand’s ecosystem needs some boosting.

Now that FIH has its aims at the financially successful stories, HMD is in a tough position on getting money for future projects. HMD still has a chance for success but needs to play its cards smartly.
People there still bleed blue, and Nokia will appreciate its brand being carried again in the pockets of the people. HMD’s management needs to focus and read carefully what the market wants, what the Nokia community wants. I would say to cut the number of devices and start giving four well-balanced devices per each price category. That would leave some space for better hardware, which could result in better sales. But, that is just me. What do you think?

 

Oh, happy third year of business HMD Global!

Cheers MichaelsoftSirFaceFone for the tip 😉