Nokia to recycle cast-off R&D projects

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Nokia to recycle cast-off R&D projects

By CAROLINE GABRIEL

Published: 12 May, 2009

READ MORE: Nokia

Nokia has created an innovative partnership to recycle R&D ideas that did not make the grade within the company itself but could have potential elsewhere. It is working with Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation, and science park operator Technopolis, to pass on these ideas for commercialization.

Nokia's extensive R&D activities produce huge numbers of innovations and only a small fraction are subsequently turned into Nokia products. The company says thousands of potentially successful ideas have been left on the shelf because they did not fit in with Nokia's own model.

The new three-year initiative is called the Nokia Technopolis Innovation Mill, and is expected to be backed to the tune of €8m by Nokia and its new partners, and €4.5m of public funding. Technopolis, one of Europe's largest science park chains, will coordinate the process and provide business development services.

Many of the ideas and embryonic products released by Nokia are in the areas of environmental and energy-related solutions, location based services and advertising, NFC, mobile security, healthcare and future internet services. All these are issues that are important to Nokia's web services and other strategies and so we can expect to see long term partnerships with some of the companies that adopt them, and even cross-marketing deals once the products are commercial, or even some of the technologies being brought back into the Nokia fold.

Nokia expects about 100 of the thousands of innovations available to be selected and taken forward, each matched with a company that demonstrates the ability to commercialize them, which will then receive a share of the funding. These can be start-ups or established Finnish players. Martti af Heurlin, deputy director general of Tekes, said: "The Nokia Technopolis Innovation Mill is fully aligned with the Finnish national strategic intent to develop new knowledge intensive ventures. Ideally, the initiative will create significant volumes of new international business."