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Pre-telecommunications era
The predecessors of the modern Nokia were Nokia Aktiebolag (Nokia Company), Suomen Gummitehdas Oy (Finnish Rubber Works) and Suomen Kaapelitehdas Oy (Finnish Cable Works).

What is known today as Nokia was established in 1865 as a wood-pulp mill by Fredrik Idestam on the banks of the Tammerkoski rapids in the town of Tampere, in south-western Finland. In 1871, Idestam founded Nokia Company with statesman Leo Mechelin when they built a second mill to the town of Nokia by the Nokianvirta river, which had better resources for hydropower production. That is where the company got the name that it still uses today. The name Nokia originated from the river which flowed through the town. The river itself, Nokianvirta, was named after the old Finnish word originally meaning a dark, furry animal that was locally known as the nokia, or sable, or later pine marten.

Later Mechelin's wish to expand into the electricity business were at first thwarted by Idestam's opposition, but Mechelin managed to convince most shareholders of his plans and became the company chairman (1898–1914), thus being able to realize his visions.

Finnish Rubber Works, manufacturer of galoshes and other rubber, established its factories in the beginning of the 20th century nearby and began using Nokia as its brand. In the 1910s, Nokia Company was nearing bankruptcy and shortly after World War I, Finnish Rubber Works acquired the company. In 1922, Finnish Rubber Works acquired Finnish Cable Works, a producer of electricity, telephone and telegraph cables. These three companies were merged to form a new industrial conglomerate, Nokia Corporation in 1967.

The new company was involved in many sectors, producing at one time or another paper products, bicycle and car tires, footwear (including Wellington boots), personal computers, communications cables, televisions, electricity generation machinery, capacitors and aluminium. Eventually, the company focused on telecommunications after the notable drop in the prices of paper in Europe. Nokian Tyres, a manufacturer of tires and Nokian Footwear (formerly Finnish Rubber Works), a manufacturer of boots split from Nokia Corporation in 1988 and 1990 respectively.

Good Gadgets

Nokia Corporation (pronounced [ˈnɔkiɑ] in Finnish) (OMX: NOK1V, NYSE: NOK, FWB: NOA3) is a Finnish multinational communications corporation, headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki. Nokia is focused on wireless and wired telecommunications, with 128,445 employees in 120 countries, sales in more than 150 countries and global annual revenue of 50.7 billion euros and operating profit of 5.0 billion as of 2008. It is the world's largest manufacturer of mobile telephones: its global device market share was about 37% in Q4 of 2008, down from 40% in Q4 2007 and down from 38% sequentially. Nokia produces mobile phones for every major market segment and protocol, including GSM, CDMA, and W-CDMA (UMTS). Nokia's subsidiary Nokia Siemens Networks produces telecommunications network equipments, solutions and services.

Nokia has sites for research and development, manufacture and sales in many continents throughout the world. As of March 2008, Nokia had R&D centers in 10 countries and employed 30,415 people in research and development, representing approximately 27% of Nokia’s total workforce.[3] The Nokia Research Center, founded in 1986, is Nokia's industrial research unit of about 800 researchers, engineers and scientists. It has sites in seven countries: Finland, Denmark, Germany, China, Japan, United Kingdom and United States. Besides its NRCs, in 2001 Nokia founded (and owns) INdT – Nokia Institute of Technology, a R&D institute located in Brazil. Nokia's production facilities are located at Espoo, Oulu and Salo, Finland; Manaus, Brazil; Beijing, Dongguan and Suzhou, China; Fleet, England; Komárom, Hungary; Chennai, India; Reynosa, Mexico; Jucu, Romania and Masan, South Korea. Nokia's Design Department remains in Salo, Finland.

Nokia plays a very large role in the economy of Finland: it is by far the largest Finnish company, accounting for about a third of the market capitalization of the Helsinki Stock Exchange (OMX Helsinki) as of 2007; a unique situation for an industrialized country It is an important employer in Finland and several small companies have grown into large ones as Nokia's subcontractors. Nokia increased Finland's GDP by more than 1.5% in 1999 alone. In 2004 Nokia's share of the Finland's GDP was 3.5% and accounted for almost a quarter of Finland's exports in 2003. In 2006, Nokia generated revenue that for the first time exceeded the state budget of Finland.

Finns have ranked Nokia many times as the best Finnish brand and employer. The Nokia brand, valued at $35.9 billion, is listed as the fifth most valuable global brand in Interbrand/BusinessWeek's Best Global Brands list of 2008 (first non-US company). It is the number one brand in Asia (as of 2007) and Europe (as of 2008), the 23rd most admirable company worldwide in Fortune's World's Most Admired Companies list of 2008 (tied with Exxon Mobil; second in Network Communications, fifth non-US company),[12] and is the world's 88th largest company in Fortune Global 500 list of 2008, up from 119 of the previous year. As of 2008, AMR Research ranks Nokia's global supply chain number two in the world