Nokia ready to work with Chinese partners on innovation

Among a series of documents signed by Chinese President Xi Jinping and his Finnish counterpart Sauli Niinisto here in April, the innovation partnership impressed Nokia's head Risto Siilasmaa the most.

As agreed by the representatives of the two countries, a Sino-Finnish innovation council would be established to guide and promote business cooperation on innovation, explore new ways and provide policy advises, Xinhua news agency reported.

As Chairman of Nokia, the Finnish IT giant, Siilasmaa has been nominated to chair the Finnish team within the council.

"Both countries will nominate key players from the industry, and I hope very much I would get some of my old friends from the Chinese technology companies to join on the other side," Siilasmaa told Xinhua news.

While the list of members of the Chinese side has not been disclosed, Siilasmaa named as hopefuls Jack Ma, Pony Ma, Lei Jun, Robin Li, respectively head of Alibaba, Tencent, Xiaomi and Baidu.

Siilasmaa has sat on the same panel discussions and in the same advisory boards with the above figures and expects to continue working with them in the new framework.

"We are committed to working very hard on finding some innovative ways for the two countries to achieve our common goals together," said Siilasmaa.

Asked to speak about the shared goals, he said: "We have certain challenges that all the humanity faces." No further details have been published by either of the two governments over the new structure so far.

Siilasmaa echos Xi's call on many occasions for embracing "a human community with shared destiny."

"We are moving towards a world that would be even smaller. So we truly have to figure out the way for all of us to live together and support each other," said Siilasmaa.

"Finnish companies are very good in certain areas, on certain narrow but very deep fields, and in those areas we definitely can have an impact on China as well," he said.

Siilasmaa appreciated the fact that Xi praised the Finnish spirit of "sisu" -- a Finnish term meaning persistence in time of hardship.

He disclosed that Nokia China is under discussion with a Chinese investor to turn the Finnish subsidiary company into a joint venture.

--IANS

py/dg