Hello everyone, and a warm welcome to this Nokia's exciting press conference, both here in Espoo and for you on the line via webcast. My name is Maria Vaismaa. I'm the Head of External Communications. Joining me here in Espoo, I have Sari Baldauf, Chair of the Nokia's Board of Directors, Pekka Lundmark, Nokia's President and CEO, and Justin Hotard, Nokia's new CEO as of April 1st, 2025. Before we get started, just a quick disclaimer. During this call, we will be making some forward-looking statements, and these statements are predictions that involve risks and uncertainties. We have identified such risk in the risk factor section of our annual report on Form 20-F, which is available on our investor relations website.
In terms of the agenda today, we will first hear from Sari, Pekka, and Justin, and after that, we will move to the Q&A session where you will have a chance to ask questions both here in the room and also via the webcast. And also, if I could just ask you all to ask all of the questions in English. So with that, let's get started. And first, I would like to hand it over to you, Sari.
Thanks, Maria. And welcome, everybody. [Foreign language]. This is about the only word I'm going to say in Finnish, because Justin's Finnish is still a little bit underdeveloped, but he's working on it. So this morning, we announced Pekka has decided to step down on March 31st this year, and the board has accepted his notice. Pekka will stay on until the year-end as a special advisor to the new CEO. We have also then today appointed Justin Hotard as the new President and CEO. He will start in his new role April 1st this year. I would like to start by saying a few words about Pekka and then continue to introduce Justin.
Planning for this leadership transition was initiated last spring, and that was when Pekka told the board that he would like to consider moving on from executive roles to different kinds of capacity, not stop working, but different kinds of capacity, when repositioning of the business is more advanced and when we will have the right successor in place and identified. Now, both of those conditions have been met, and when we do, I just want to say also that when we do succession planning and assessing the leadership development, that is done covering both internal and external candidates. I would like to then talk a little bit about Pekka's tenure at Nokia. Pekka started at a difficult time in Nokia's history, and I would like to say a few things that have been achieved during his tenure.
Nokia has re-established its technology leadership in 5G radio networks and also built a strong position in cloud-native core networks and achieved significant growth and profitability improvement in Network Infrastructure business. It also secured longevity of the patent licensing business within Nokia Tech, and in addition, also built strong foundations in new growth areas outside of telco markets. Nokia's brand has been refreshed. There's been also refreshment work on the culture. The operational model has been transformed, and the portfolio has been rebalanced. With all these achievements, the board understands and respects Pekka's decision to move on, and we are very grateful for his commitment to smooth transition, which is a good bridge then to say how delighted I am to welcome Justin to Nokia. Justin joins Nokia with more than 25 years of experience with global technology companies, driving innovation, technology leadership, and delivering revenue growth.
Justin currently leads the Data Center and AI Group at Intel, and prior to that role, he held several leadership roles at large technology companies, including HP, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, NCR, and Motorola. He has a strong track record of accelerating growth in technology and has a vast expertise in AI and data center markets, which are critical for Nokia's future growth. In his previous roles and throughout the selection process, he has demonstrated the strategic insight, vision, leadership, and value creation mindset, which is required for a CEO of Nokia. Justin will be based here in Espoo. With this, I would like to hand over first Pekka and then to Justin. Please, Pekka.
Hey, thank you very much, Sari. I would like to start by saying that it has been a true privilege to lead Nokia and lead Nokia with a team that clearly is one of the best in the industry. This type of decisions are always very difficult, and in a way, the timing is never perfect. Timing is never perfect, but still, I feel that now is the right time. We are well positioned for growth in new markets such as data centers, private industrial networks, and communication solutions for the defense sector, and to continue to take market share with the service provider customers. And of course, an encouraging thing is that after a pretty steep downturn in operator investments in 2023 and first half of 2024, we are now clearly seeing that the markets have started to recover, which is a very good thing.
As you all have seen, we ended the year with a pretty good quarter with 9% growth, 16% growth in North America, the best margin in 10 years, and on top of that, excellent deal momentum. Nokia has fantastic potential in this new era where, in a way, you could say that AI, cloud, and connectivity are all coming together. Perhaps a little bit on a more personal note about the timing and why I'm doing this. I have led the listed companies for 23 years, and that's 92 quarters. That's a lot of quarters. I do not plan to stop working, but I want to work in a different capacity. I want to move on from executive roles to work in a different way, for example, as a board professional.
I believe that this will be a very good transition for Nokia, and very much because I believe that Justin is a great choice for Nokia. I will continue to run the company through the first quarter, and then after that, I will stay until the end of the year to help Justin to ensure a smooth transition for employees, customers, partners, and of course, very importantly, investors. So with that, I'm happy to hand over to Justin.
Congratulations, Pekka, and thank you for the kind words. Sorry also, I want to say thank you to you and the board of directors for entrusting me in this opportunity. I'm honored to have the opportunity to lead Nokia, and I'm very excited to get started. As Sari mentioned, I will be based here in Espoo, and my family will be relocating to Finland. Nokia attracted me because it is a global leader in connectivity and one with a unique heritage in technology and a history of successful transformation. From mobile networks to mobile phones to networks to building the advanced connectivity that is enabling the AI era, Nokia is driving and enabling and accelerating change. It's also a truly global company.
It has a strong core base here in Finland, but a strong base throughout Europe, Asia, India, the Middle East, and of course, as Pekka has remarked before, a bit of a second home in the United States. I think we're also at a really interesting time in the market because we are at the start of what is a super cycle with AI, one that I see very similar to what we saw a couple of decades ago with the internet. In these major market transitions, new winners are created, and incumbents either reinvent themselves or fail. To that point, Pekka, the board, and the Nokia team have done a great job to reposition Nokia to take advantage of this market opportunity. My focus will be to accelerate the transformation journey and drive even greater growth.
As Sari mentioned, in prior roles, I've had success repositioning technology businesses to drive growth, and I've done that through capital reallocation, portfolio transformation, development of teams and talent, with a focus on core R&D and innovation and a connection with deep customer intimacy. As I get started in my first 100 days, I will spend time with employees, customers, partners, investors, and other key stakeholders to listen and to learn from them, and my focus will be to lead Nokia to maximize its potential for growth and value creation. Thank you, and let me turn it back to Maria for Q&A.
Thank you very much. Thank you, Justin, Pekka, and Sari. So let's get now started with the Q&A. But before we start, just a quick one that asks for a usual Q&A session, and as a courtesy of others in the queue, could you please limit yourself to one question at a time and a brief follow-up? And with that, Sandra, could you please give the instructions for the questions?
We will now begin the question and answer session. If you're also viewing the webcast, please remember to mute the audio on your computer before asking your question, as there is a 30-second delay. To ask a question, you may press star and one on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your headset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star and two.
Thank you, Sandra. And with that, let's get started. Do we have first question from the room? Petri, did you have your hand up? Or we can take it also from the line. So from the line, we have the first question from Daniel Djurberg from Handelsbanken.
Thank you very much, and good morning, Sari, Pekka, and Justin. A question for me would be then that your role is, as you said, Justin, to accelerate the transformation journey within Nokia that already started. But should we anticipate any structural reviews on Nokia's group on the back of this, or is it more of transformation within the current building blocks? Thanks.
And as I touched on, my focus coming in will be to spend time across all of the stakeholder groups to listen and to learn. And as I do that, I will communicate more.
Thank you.
Thank you, Daniel. And do we have a question from the room?
Yes, Artem Beletski from SEB. I would like to thank you, Pekka, at this stage for all these years at Nokia. You have done a great job. And of course, Justin, welcome. I would like to ask from Justin, as you have extensive experience within data centers, and what is your, let's say, feel at this stage, what role Nokia has to play in that field? And of course, also given pending acquisition of Infinera, so maybe thoughts on that front. And also just a curiosity, as you issued this EUR 1 billion additional revenue target within data centers by 2028, have you been involved in this process when this target was set?
Do you want to maybe start there, and I can answer the second part?
Justin said that we don't sort of make the CEOs to work that much before in time before they are appointed and the board takes decisions. Go ahead.
I mean, if I start on the comment on the data centers, and of course, Justin and I have been communicating on the general attractiveness on the data center market, hey, look, it's a very large market. And we quoted a number, EUR 20 billion, depending on how which part exactly you say is addressable. What we said in the Q4 is that we will accelerate our investments, which already today are substantial, but we are adding EUR 100 million on an annual basis to investment. And with that, we target on a net basis, EUR 1 billion additional revenue by 2028. You need to put that in context against the EUR 20 billion market, which is growing fast. And of course, now under Justin's leadership in the coming months and quarters and years, they will then set the next targets for that. But this is where we have started from.
And yes, absolutely, we have communicated with Justin on this, but perhaps you want to comment a little bit more from your vantage point and with your background in this industry.
Yeah, I think you covered it very well, Pekka. Maybe what I would add in terms of opportunity is if you look at what is happening in the data center. Just this morning, of course, President Macron talked about an investment and commitment to invest in France, but the hundreds of billions of dollars being invested in data center today. From a technology standpoint, of course, start with compute accelerators and GPUs, but the second thing is the network and the connectivity. And further, it's not just the connectivity inside the data center, but the connectivity across data centers. And I think it's also we can focus on core network infrastructure, but if we believe that we will have multiple waves to AI in the future, I think there will be opportunities in mobile networks as well. So I think there is a tremendous opportunity.
You mentioned the acquisition of Infinera. I'm looking forward to seeing that close before I start, and obviously working with the Nokia team to make sure we successfully integrate that acquisition and maximize value capture.
Thank you very much, Justin, and thank you, Artem. Then the next question from Petri from Helsingin Sanomat.
Yes, Petri Sajari from Helsingin Sanomat. How would you describe Nokia's position regarding its main competitor, which is from the neighboring country, Ericsson?
I don't know which of us the question was, but if I may start and then jump, Justin. I mean, the first thing to remember is, of course, that we do not have an identical portfolio with Ericsson, and of course, we respect them a lot as a competitor in radio networks. We are slightly behind them in terms of market share, but we have had a great deal momentum lately. You will have seen some of the deal announcements, and very importantly, the feedback we are receiving from our customers is that we are now fully competitive in terms of our portfolio, and then we are using that portfolio to expand to new segments like defense communications, where we are offering 5G as a fundamental platform.
But then a very important difference is, of course, the fact that we have the Network Infrastructure business, where, of course, one key focus area is the upcoming growth in data centers that we are already now seeing through the Microsoft deal, for example, during Q4. And then as an additional and perhaps final point, I talked about the 5G radio network and then the difference from network infrastructure, the segment where we have had particular success against all our competitors, including the one you mentioned, is really the core networks, the 5G core networks, standalone core, where we clearly have taken the lead in the cloudification or the creation of cloud-native core networks, which will allow efficient operations, efficient automation of the core network. And when you automate the core network, you will be able to make the network resources available to application developers through APIs.
So these are all kind of the segments where we have clearly taken global lead recently against all our competitors.
All right, then probably a follow-up to Mr. Hotard. So every company in technology is now talking about AI and data centers and so on. So what is the main factor for Nokia to differentiate from their competitors?
A few things that have struck me in spending time studying the company from the outside, and of course, as I said, I look forward to my first 100 days really learning on the inside, but I think from the outside, it's the heritage and the strong customer base, telco customer base that gives it an advantage because these are some of the most demanding customers in terms of innovation, in terms of reliability, in terms of customer support and service, and I think as we look at the opportunity in AI, this gives us a great opportunity to differentiate as we move into the hyperscale customers and also the emerging neocloud customers that are coming up, so I think there's a tremendous opportunity for us on a global basis to win in this market.
Thank you very much, Justin, and thank you, Petri, and then we have the next question coming from Sami Sarkamies from Danske Bank.
Okay, hi. Sami Sarkamies from Danske Bank. First of all, I want to express my gratitude to Pekka for these years. My question would be to Justin. You've been involved in several transformations over the years. You have seen how growth can be accelerated. What does it take? What are some of the learnings from the past, and how would you assess the current spending level at Nokia? Is it adequate for the data center business?
Yeah, I think there are four things that I tend to focus on successfully. Number one is focus, picking the markets where you're going to win, because oftentimes the mistake is not investing enough versus investing too much. The second is what I talked about, a core focus on R&D as a driver of differentiation. The third is customer intimacy. And then the fourth is obviously the team, making sure we have the right people in the right positions at the right time to be able to execute. And so for me, those four things are very important. Then whether it is organic, inorganic, partnership, there are many avenues which we can execute. But those are my key learnings. And I believe, as I said, that Pekka, the Nokia team and the board have done a fantastic job to position the company to be able to capture this.
My focus as I come in and spend time with our customers and with our teams and other stakeholders is to see how I can further accelerate it.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Justin. And then we have the next question coming in from Tatu from Kauppalehti. Tatu Sailaranta, go ahead, please.
Hello. My name is Tatu. I'm from Kauppalehti. First off, I would like to thank Pekka for all these years at Nokia. First, I have a question for Justin. Nokia has been interested in defense technology and defense communications. So how do you, Justin, see that part?
I think as Pekka touched on in his comments, I see that as a key growth opportunity. Obviously, the acquisition of Fenix was one of the inorganic maneuvers to position the company. But I see it as a key opportunity across our portfolio.
Thank you, Justin. And then we have the next question from Petri from Helsingin Sanomat. Go ahead, please, Petri.
This question goes to Chair Sari Baldauf. Internal or external candidates? So I'm pretty sure that you have had some quite strong internal candidates as well.
Sure. We have a strong team.
Yes. So can you give us a little bit of color of the decision-making? So why did you choose to pick up an external candidate?
Like I said in the opening words, when we do succession planning within the company, including the entire GLT, we always look at both internal and external candidates. And then, of course, what drives that assessment and criteria are how we see the strategy developing, the market developing, and what are important from that point of view. And as I said, we have strong people within the company. I would also like to say so that even though, of course, the role of CEO is extremely important, but it's about the team. And it's about having a team with complementing capabilities so that you can really build and execute the strategy. So Justin is bringing new capabilities into the team. And then I believe that working together with the existing team members, we can then create even stronger strategies.
And then, of course, if you look at the market and look at the world, the U.S. is an important market for us. So that is one element that we consider experience from that technology business there.
Thank you very much, Sari. Do we still have some questions on the line or in the room? Final opportunity?
Not final. I think they both will talk at later stages also.
But if we don't have any more questions for today, I would like to thank you all for your questions today and thank you so much for your answers, Sari, Justin, and Pekka. Ladies and gentlemen, now this concludes today's press conference. I would just like to remind you that during the press conference again today, we made a number of forward-looking statements. These statements are predictions that involve risks and uncertainties. The factors that could cause such differences can be both external as well as internal operating factors. We have identified such risks in the risk factor section of our annual report Form 20-F, which is available on our investor relations website.
Thank you again all for sharing this morning with us. I wish you all a pleasant day. I would just like to remind you that if you can all make your way out from that exit there, the blue round-shaped exit sign, that would be great. We will talk later. Thank you very much, both here in the room and then also via the webcast. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's call. You may now disconnect.