Finnish telecoms firm Nokia once ruled the mobile world but failed to adapt to the smartphone era spearheaded by Apple and Google. The company later sold its mobile phone business to Microsoft in 2014, but the deal was a disaster.
Now, Nokia has redesigned its logo to remind the world that it doesn’t make mobile phones anymore.
“In most people’s minds, we are still a successful mobile phone brand, but this is not what Nokia is about,” said Nokia CEO Pekka Lundmark.
“We want to launch a new brand that is focusing very much on the networks and industrial digitalization, which is a completely different thing from the legacy mobile phones.”
Nokia revealed its new brand identity on Sunday at MWC — the first major redesign of the firm’s logo in nearly 60 years. The company has come a long way since its founding as a single paper mill operation in 1865. Its original logo featured a salmon head — a reference to the Nokianvirta river by which the mill was established and which gave the company its name.
According to mobile analyst Ben Wood, Nokia has said the rebrand this week will not affect the branding license used by HMD to market its own devices. HMD revealed a new repairable smartphone just days ago, complete with the original Nokia logo.
Nokia itself now makes money through businesses including the sale of networking equipment and the licensing of its many patents, including to mobile makers. The company has also been pushing hard into 5G, with this portion of its business buoyed by bans on equipment manufactured by Chinese rival Huawei.
In a blog post, Lundmark said the company’s new logo “captures Nokia as we are today, with renewed energy and commitment as pioneers of digital transformation.”
