HMD Global makes the Nokia-branded phones under licence, and since 2024 sells under its own HMD name too, positioned on phones you can repair yourself.
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HMD Global is the company that makes Nokia-branded phones, and it is not Nokia. That distinction matters more than it sounds: Nokia Corporation still exists, still makes telecommunications network equipment, and hasn't made phones since selling that business to Microsoft in 2014. HMD holds a licence from Nokia for the brand on phones. The original 2016 deal gave it exclusive global rights for Nokia phones and tablets for ten years, outside Japan.
HMD was set up in Finland on 18 May 2016. The same day, Microsoft agreed to sell its feature phone business to FIH Mobile, a Foxconn subsidiary, and HMD for USD 350 million, with HMD taking the right to use the Nokia name on feature phones. The deals closed that December, and HMD started selling Nokia phones.
It has covered both ends of the range since: Android smartphones, and the basic feature phones that keep selling in volumes the industry rarely talks about.
Since 2024 it has also sold phones under its own HMD name, starting with the HMD Pulse family. They're built around repairability, with iFixit kits for swapping screens, charging ports and batteries, at a point when most of the industry had made that steadily harder.
What this company states about how it works. Figures carrying a source were checked against the page they link to; the rest are the company's own.
Stated by the company
Basic handsets, including revivals of classic Nokia designs. Still a substantial market where battery life and cost outweigh everything else.
The repairable flagship, with a design intended for the owner to replace the battery and screen themselves.
Independent coverage of HMD Global from the Brandligo blog.
HMD Global continues to impress with its lineup of Nokia feature phones, introducing the latest models: the Nokia 108 4G (2024) and the Nokia 125 4G (2024). The...
· Junaid Abro
