Foxconn hopes to buy Nokia's phone manufacturing plants

Nov 30, 2009 10:16 GMT  ·  By

Finnish mobile phone maker Nokia is said to be considering some radical changes when it comes to its future. Among the possible moves that the company is thinking of, one might include the selling of its handset division. This is not something that one should expect to happen in short term, it seems, but it does sound like something very interesting, especially since it involves the largest mobile phone maker in the world.

The said possibility was unveiled by Nokia’s Head of marketing Anssi Vanjoki, in an interview with the German magazine Wirtschaftswoche, reports Reuters. He talked about the need for Nokia to quickly “boost its offering of mobile internet solutions,” and also mentioned that the selling of its handset division was a possibility that the company was taking into consideration on the long term.

As soon as the news emerged, a series of rumors on possible buyers for the Nokia handset making division also came to life. Among them, DigiTimes reports that the Taiwan-based EMS firm Foxconn Electronics might have great chances to purchase Nokia's handset manufacturing business, in case the company decides to put it on sale.

However, the news site, which cites the Chinese-language Economic Daily News (EDN) paper, suggest that Foxconn would be in a better position to make the purchase when compared to rivals Elcoteq and Jabil, and points towards two other Taiwanese companies that might be interested in acquiring the handset division from Nokia. For what it's worth, in case Nokia would indeed sell the business, one should rest assured that many other interested companies will emerge.

“Two other Taiwan companies, the Compal Group and Lite-On Technology may also emerge as potential buyers, the paper said, noting that the Compal Group is currently Nokia's production partner for 3G netbooks and CDMA handsets, while Lite-On is cooperating with Nokia through handset casing maker Perlos. Lite-On acquired the Finland-based Perlos in 2007,” DigiTimes notes.