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Nokia cuts R&D numbers
Hundreds to go

By Tony Hallett

Published: Wednesday 12 January 2005

Nokia, one of tech's biggest spenders on research and development, is cutting back in that area with the culling of 250 staff in Finland and around an additional 100 elsewhere.

The telecoms vendor has four main divisions broadly covering handsets, network infrastructure, enterprise connectivity and multimedia products. The R&D cuts will affect the last of those units.

Nokia has spent above the industry average, measured as a percentage of its revenues, on R&D in recent years and last year it was in the same bracket as IBM and Microsoft according to recent figures from the UK's Department of Trade and Industry.

The scaling back to something more like the average tech R&D spend looks set to affect some of the vendor's more experimental designs, many based on futuristic wearable technology. However, there is speculation the company's N-Gage gamedeck phone - which hasn't lived up to expectations - may end up being affected.

A statement from Nokia said the cuts, due this year, mean "Multimedia product roadmaps have been streamlined and cross-functional synergies have been identified."

Operations in Germany will be most affected after those in its home country.

Globally, IT hardware, software and telecoms accounts for more R&D spend than any other business area. In the UK, pharmaceuticals/biotech and aerospace/defence see the most spend.