Nokia on target with $960m profit

Mobile phone giant Nokia has hit its targets with a $960m profit for the third quarter of 2003 - suggesting growth in the handset market contributed to its fortune.

The $960m is up more than one-third from $711m for the comparable quarter last year. However, the mighty Finn's revenue slipped to just over $8bn for the quarter, compared to $8.4bn in the year-ago period. Earnings per share remained flat at 21 cents.

Nokia blamed the revenue downturn on weakness in the US dollar, given that it sold 23 per cent more handsets during the September quarter than in the year-ago quarter, outpacing the growth of the market as a whole. The company said it shipped 45.5 million handsets during the third quarter, out of total market shipments of an estimated 118 million units.

For the year, the company projected that industry-wide handset sales will reach 460 million.

Nokia estimated that its share of the overall mobile phone market rose to 39 per cent for the quarter, up from 36 per cent in third quarter of last year. The phone maker said it experienced continued strength in Europe, the US and the Americas, along with growing demand in the Chinese market for GSM handsets.

Shipments of the company's CDMA handsets to China, India and the US increased during the third quarter, boosting its presence in the global market for that technology, Nokia said.

The company said it also saw evidence of stabilisation in its mobile networks business with improved financial performance from its major customers. Nokia said that Western European operators in particular expressed renewed commitment to wireless CDMA during the third quarter.

Nokia also detailed plans to revamp its corporate structure beginning in January 2004, dividing itself into four business units - mobile phones, multimedia, networks and enterprise solutions.

Matt Hines writes for News.com