Finnish telecoms manufacturer Nokia is to merge its four joint ventures in China and start local production of CDMA handsets, the Financial Times said. Nokia will own more than 60 per cent of the new company, with Chinese partners holding the balance. The handsets will use Nokia's own chipsets, rather than those supplied by Qualcomm of the US under licence.
The move is part of a strategy by Nokia to close the gap with Motorola of the US, which holds an estimated 30 per cent of the Chinese market compared with Nokia's 20 per cent. Nokia is in talks with China Unicom to supply low-cost CDMA handsets, Bloomberg reported. China Unicom, China's second largest cellular network, is aiming to add 13m new CDMA customers this year.