The Nokia Revolution : The Story of an Extraordinary Company That Transformed an Industry by Dan Steinbock

Product Description

Tucked away in one of Europe's most far-flung corners, the Finnish Nokia Corporation has emerged in the past decade from near-obscurity to become a global powerhouse in mobile communications and a leader in the development of third-generation wireless services.

How did they do it? How did the 140-year-old company manage to survive the political upheavals of its age? What re-creations did the company undergo as it moved from forest-industry enterprise to European technology conglomerate to global cellular phone maker--and now, to its latest incarnation, as a mobile Internet vendor?

The Nokia Revolution probes behind the company's official, often enigmatic veneer to uncover how Nokia operates, how its chief executives think, and how it listens to the pulse of the market. As such, it is the first strategic study of this extraordinary company, focusing on the way Nokia has built its existing capabilities into competitive advantages.

The book probes far beyond the breezy articles and lightweight press release recyclings. It concentrates instead on the company's extraordinary historical evolution, the creation of its global focus strategy, and the innovations that are preparing Nokia for a mobile information society.

The Nokia Revolution transcends the immediacy of a single company or industry profile. It offers keen insights into what it's like to compete in a fast-cycle, cutthroat, volatile environment. And it offers compelling lessons for both established industry leaders who need to sustain and renew their marketplace dominance and upstarts seeking to topple the giants.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #849300 in Books
Published on: 2001-05-31
Number of items: 1
Binding: Hardcover
352 pages
Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Intended for the PowerPoint and Palm Pilot crowd, this dense book is packed with the results of Steinbock's prodigious research into the mobile communications behemoth, including reams of charts, stats and history that are likely to overwhelm casual readers. Nokia, which now dominates wireless communications worldwide, started in 1865 as a small timber concern in rural Finland. A little more than 100 years later, it merged with a rubber works company and a cabling firm to form the Nokia Corporation. In the late 1970s and '80s, the energetic and charming Kari Kairamo guided the company's transformation into a diversified, global corporation that led many extraordinary advances in portable communications. Tragically, the mercurial Kairamo committed suicide in 1988. Jorma Ollila was made CEO in 1992. While Motorola and Ericsson concentrated on developing new technologies during the 1990s, Nokia focused on digital (as opposed to analog) phones. Today, Nokia makes about one out of every three cell phones in the world and is truly international: about half of the company's 55,000 employees (all of whom speak English) are Finnish, yet less than 3% of Nokia's revenues come from Finland. While the author, a "visiting virtual professor" at the Helsinki School of Economics as well as a researcher at the Columbia Business School, is clearly enamored with the company, he never slips into mindless praise, letting Nokia's record speak for itself. (June 29)Forecast: The dot-coms are going up in smoke, but we still have our Nokias. Amid New Economy eulogies, readers interested in mobile communications and corporate strategy will be glad to find a high-tech success story they can still believe in.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Steinbock tells the story of Nokia, the 140-year-old Finnish company that has become a global powerhouse in mobile communications and a leader in the development of third-generation wireless services. The company's management obviously cooperated in this report, for we see how it thinks, how it listens to its markets, and how it has designed remarkable strategies, all of which have, in the last 10 years, made the company a case study in corporate success, with stock trading in May 2000 at approximately 100 times earnings. This is excellent public relations for the company, which the author describes as unique in its persistence, its alignment between upstream and downstream innovation, and its recent dogged efforts to globalize and conquer world markets. Part 1 recounts the history of the company, Part 2 covers the creation and evolution of Nokia's globalization strategy, and part 3 describes Nokia's preparation and innovation. A formidable global competitor, the company has its sights now set on the "next big thing": the mobile Internet. Mary Whaley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

The Financial Times
"...a valuable reference for anyone attempting to find out how Nokia works."
Customer Reviews

A staggeringly in-depth study of a fascinating company
There is no doubt that Nokia has grown from a small Finnish firm into the worldwide leader in cellular and mobile communication technology. How did the firm accomplish this revolution? In this book, Dan, Steinbock, answers this question by tracing the history of Nokia. Looking at the steps Nokia took, including the missteps, the author accurately traces both huge successes, and mistakes. More importantly the author shows how Nokia learned from its mistakes and came back from each misstep stronger. The author hits on some key factors that make Nokia such a strong firm:

· Strategic Intent. In an ever changing market, learn how Nokia took some early missteps. These missteps made Nokia stronger because in 1992 these missteps forced Nokia to move toward process-based management. It used this style to successfully transfer a strategic intent that would motivate every employee.
· Global Focus. Nokia's leadership recognized that in this new environment, the ability to segment markets and target niche segments within those markets was critical to success. In order to compete, Nokia would need to focus globally.
· Strategic Market-Making. With the dynamic market of cellular technology, Nokia's executive board managed to discover and implement a strategy that delivered success.
· Focus on People. Nokia treated its Human Resource management as a strategic issue. Nokia focused on utilizing a drive to achieve customer satisfaction, a respect for the individual, a willingness to achieve and belief in continuous learning, and by encouraging sharing of information and responsibility.
· Global R&D. Nokia spends less than its rivals on R&D. What there efforts lack in funding, they make up for with an efficient system to leverage and exploit new knowledge. Nokia has been active in both upstream (Nokia) and downstream (people-service related factors) innovation.

NOKIA -- More Cameras than KODAK in the World....
Read this book because Nokia is not just a cell phone producer but also a leader in R&D and interface design and yes, they now sell more cameras than Kodak in the world. I should know because I write about this field for imediaconnection.com and this is a book that is definitely on my shelf. Hard to understand how this company not only influenced a country --but also a generation and a world of new media and technology. TV2Go--, games, 3G and more -- it's all on the horizon-- the surf is about to roar in-- make sure you're prepared for the next generation of devices, handhelds and mobile. read this book.

Heavy book and heavy reading
The book is very well written and gives a nice detailed background of Nokia. The book is however very hard to read since you have to look acronyms up and all the time divert your attention from the text too look at the many graphs. It is not a smooth read but the content of the book is very good and well documented.

Cornelius SAMOHI