Nokia inks €1 billion framework agreement with China Mobile

A new agreement, valued at €1 billion ($1.17 billion, £0.88 billion), has been signed that covers the delivery of Nokia products and services to China Mobile throughout 2018.

Wei Shi

July 11, 2018

1 Min Read
Nokia

A new agreement, valued at €1 billion ($1.17 billion, £0.88 billion), has been signed that covers the delivery of Nokia products and services to China Mobile throughout 2018.

The signing took place in Berlin during the fifth iteration of the inter-governmental economic forum between Germany and China, starring the German Chancellor Angela Markel and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. This capped a busy week for Nokia’s business updates with China, during which time it also signed MoUs to set up joint labs with Tencent and China Mobile respectively.

Nokia was already one of the key vendors in China when the first its mobile telecom networks were rolled out there in the late 20th century. However, it was only recently, after it bought Siemens out of their joint-venture, then acquired Alcatel-Lucent including the legendary Bell Labs, did Nokia become a credible end-to-end supplier. In this new agreement Nokia’s supplies to China Mobile will include the full range of equipment and services from access, backbone, transport, to network management.

Mike Wang, President of Nokia Shanghai Bell, which will be the front-end implementation entity with China Mobile, saw this agreement “highly significant”, consolidating “Nokia’s position as a leading provider of next-generation technologies and services in China.” Chinese companies are much more aggressive in rolling out 5G in scale than their Western European counterparts.

About the Author

Wei Shi

Wei leads the Telecoms.com Intelligence function. His responsibilities include managing and producing premium content for Telecoms.com Intelligence, undertaking special projects, and supporting internal and external partners. Wei’s research and writing have followed the heartbeat of the telecoms industry. His recent long form publications cover topics ranging from 5G and beyond, edge computing, and digital transformation, to artificial intelligence, telco cloud, and 5G devices. Wei also regularly contributes to the Telecoms.com news site and other group titles when he puts on his technology journalist hat. Wei has two decades’ experience in the telecoms ecosystem in Asia and Europe, both on the corporate side and on the professional service side. His former employers include Nokia and Strategy Analytics. Wei is a graduate of The London School of Economics. He speaks English, French, and Chinese, and has a working knowledge of Finnish and German. He is based in Telecom.com’s London office.

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