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The Chennai plant may be excluded from software giant Microsoft's acquisition of Nokia's handset business for 5.4 billion euros due to tax issues.
Let's just say it upfront: the start-up HMD, which is now using the Nokia name, doesn't disappoint.
The deal with Nokia will be signed in San Francisco on Friday morning in the presence of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin, who is on a 17-day trip to the US to attract fresh investments.
Nokia may be allowed to sell Chennai mobile plant.
Finnish phone manufacturer Human Mobile Devices (HMD Global), which acquired the Nokia brand name from Microsoft, is planning to make India a key manufacturing hub for its phone exports. The company only began exporting late last year with the Nokia 105 Classic. What started mainly with feature phones will now extend to smartphones - it announced the global launch of models under the HMD brand for the first time a few days ago and these will be available in India too.
Nokia started operations at Sriperumbudur plant near Chennai, the second biggest facilities by any global firm, in 2006 after Korean auto major Hyundai's came up with its plant in the late 1990s.
Nokia said that it will be informing all stakeholders including the Labour Commissioner of the suspension.
Telecom gearmaker Nokia will boost its manufacturing capacity in India by 1.5x over the next few years to support the 5G services roll-out, said Tarun Chhabra, the company's country head of mobile networks business. Nokia is supplying network equipment to Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio for their 5G networks from its plant in Chennai. Vodafone Idea is yet to finalise its contract as it awaits fresh funding.
Cheap data plans, affordable handsets, increasing popularity of video services and 4G networks have helped average data consumption per user in India to grow to over 11 GB a month, telecom gear maker Nokia said on Thursday. Nokia -- in its annual Mobile Broadband India Traffic Index (MBiT) report -- said the overall data traffic in India increased by 47 per cent in 2019, driven by continued 4G consumption. 4G data constitute 96 per cent of the total data traffic consumed across the country, while 3G data traffic registered its highest ever decline of 30 per cent, it added.
Nokia is one of the leading telecom equipment manufacturing companies in India
In February this year, Nokia had announced the 'Nokia X' family of affordable smartphones, running Google's Android apps, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Nokia, that has already begun manufacturing of 5G equipment at its Chennai plant, is also readying for exporting the products to several key markets like the US.
The decision to shut down the Chennai plant will reduce valuation of Nokia for Microsoft
Nokia said the freezing of the fixed assets would not have any impact on the day-to-day operations of the company.
In the factory, workers said Friday was the last day as far as production was concerned.
Fate of factory, 8,000 workers remains uncertain.
There are big tradeoffs involved and it has invested heavily here; an unfriendly tax regime, though, might push it out to a country such as Vietnam.
Nokia said it was the first to manufacture the 5G New Radio in India, and it is now producing Nokia AirScale massive Multiple Input Multiple Output solution at the facility.
The company moved the income-tax appellate tribunal and its appeal is pending there.
Nokia has managed to enter the top-five list in the feature phone market within six months of its comeback
Nokia launches Nokia 7 Plus, 8 Sirocco series in India; relaunches Nokia 6 with new features.
Unions will 'fight to death' if company 'decides' to shut Chennai factory.
While the tax holiday for the factory coming to an end might be a factor, many say the business model of Microsoft (which acquired Nokia's handset division last year), as well as freebies offered by the Vietnamese government, might also have played a role.
India is one of the fastest growing markets right now in terms of mobile phone consumption and usage.
"The company plans to come up with internet-based services for the rural market soon," Nokia Corporation President and CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo told reporters in New Delhi. The company would also introduce these services in its mid-level mobile devices as well. The Finland-based company is looking at micro finance as a major initiative to increase mobile penetration in India from the current 26 per cent.
Can the launch of smartphones under its own brand name by Finnish company HMD Global - despite having a licence to use the Nokia brand which it bought from Microsoft - help it regain its once dominant position in the mobile phone sweepstakes in India, where it was once routed? In 2009, Nokia was the country's largest MNC with revenues of $4 billion and a market share touching 80 per cent in 2010. After this, its fortunes fell. Although it had been the first global player to set up an assembly plant, not only to assemble phones for the local market but for exports, it had to shut down operations in 2014.
Reliance Jio is close to finalising its contract with telecom gear maker Ericsson to roll out its 5G network in Mumbai and Maharashtra and Kolkata and West Bengal in the first phase of its launch in October. And it is going with Nokia for the lucrative Delhi circle, and Chennai, which includes Tamil Nadu, say sources aware of the development. This is the first time that Jio is opting for multiple vendors.
In a separate tax case, the Supreme Court had ordered Nokia India on March 14 to give a Rs 3,500 crore or Rs 35 billion guarantee before it transfers the plant to Microsoft.
The department has calculated and arrived at the figure and may raise two separate demands.
1.4 mn songs are getting downloaded through the Nokia Music Store every day.
Mobile phone maker Nokia announced the launch of its most affordable handset -- Nokia 105 -- in the Indian market aimed at first time buyers.
The company currently employs over 9,000 people and has 95,000 outlets with 50,000 exclusive Nokia brand stores.
The Delhi High Court on Thursday asked the Income Tax (IT) department to take a decision on the offer of Finnish mobile maker Nokia to pay a minimum deposit of Rs 2,250 crore (Rs 22.50 billion) to it towards the tax liability of the company which is nearly Rs 6,500 crore (Rs 65 billion).
In more trouble for Finnish mobile firm Nokia, whose immovable assets were attached in an alleged tax evasion case recently, the Income Tax department is set to issue fresh demand notices for payment of taxes to the tune of Rs 1,000 crore (Rs 10 billion).
Mobile phone giant Nokia's market share in India has increased to 62.5 per cent in 2007-08 from 53.6 per cent in the previous year, according to a survey by Voice & Data.
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