nokia

By Eric Auchard, Jussi Rosendahl and Leila Abboud FRANKFURT/HELSINKI (Reuters) – Nokia is hiring software experts, testing new products and seeking sales partners as it plots its return to the mobile phone and consumer tech arena it abandoned with the sale of its handset business. Once the world's biggest maker of mobile phones, the Finnish firm was wrongfooted by the rise of smartphones and eclipsed by Apple and Samsung . It sold its handset business to Microsoft in late 2013 and has since focused squarely on making telecoms network equipment.

Finland's Nokia denied reports in Chinese media that it planned to return to manufacturing phones. “Nokia notes recent news reports claiming the company communicated an intention to manufacture consumer handsets out of a R&D facility in China. These reports are false,” Nokia said in a statement posted on its website. “Nokia reiterates it currently has no plans to manufacture or sell consumer handsets.” However, Nokia has said it is looking into returning to the smartphones business by brand-licensing.

By Dan Levine SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A U.S. appeals court appeared skeptical on Wednesday toward Google Inc's bid to charge Microsoft Corp a high royalty rate to use some of the Internet search provider's Motorola Mobility patents. Microsoft sued Motorola in 2010, alleging Motorola breached its commitment to license some of its industry standard patents on fair terms. After a 2012 trial, a Seattle federal judge found that the appropriate rate for Motorola to license certain wireless and video technology used in the Xbox game console was only a fraction of what Motorola had asked for. Google sold the Motorola handset business to Lenovo last year, but kept its patents.

Nokia, the world's third-largest mobile equipment maker, has seen nothing in its business that would lead it to change its financial outlook, its chief executive said on Sunday. It is kind of business as usual,” Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri said in response to a reporter's question during a press conference ahead of the Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona. In late January, the company said that for its mainstay Nokia Networks’ business, it expected net sales and operating margins in the first quarter to decline compared to the fourth quarter of 2014, typically a seasonally stronger quarter.

(Reuters) – Microsoft Corp said it would roll out its Lumia 535 smartphone this month with an affordable price tag in its key markets, dropping the Nokia name just months after buying the Finnish company's handset business. Loaded with its latest Windows Phone 8.1 operating system, the Lumia 535 and Lumia 535 dual SIM will be priced at around 110 euros (about $137) before taxes and subsidies, Microsoft said in a statement. The phone will feature a wide-angle 5 megapixel front-facing camera and a 5-inch qHD display screen, the company said. …