
NEW DELHI: Nokia and Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi on Wednesday signed a patent licensing agreement where Xiaomi will acquire key patent assets from Nokia.
“Xiaomi is one of the world’s leading smart phone manufacturers and we are delighted to have reached an agreement with them,” said Rajeev Suri, president and CEO of Nokia. Adding, “In addition to welcoming such a prominent global technology company to our family of patent licensees, we look forward to working together on a wide range of strategic projects.”
Under the agreement, Nokia is poised to provide network infrastructure equipment. The equipment will aim to deliver high-capacity, low-power requirements, which are expected by large web providers and data centre operators. Both the companies will collaboratively work on IP routing based on Nokia’s newly announced FP4 network processor, optical transport solutions for data centre interconnect and a data center fabric solution.
Nokia has licence deals with leading handset makers Apple and Samsung Electronics, but the agreement with Xiaomi is the Finnish company’s first one with a Chinese phone maker.
Suri also mentioned that both the companies have agreed to explore opportunities for further cooperation in areas such as Internet of Things, augmented and virtual reality and artificial intelligence.
“As a company seeking to deliver more exciting technological innovations to the world, we are excited at the opportunity to work more closely with Nokia in the future. We are committed to building sustainable, long-term partnerships with global technology leaders,” said Lei Jun, chairman and CEO of Xiaomi.