Nokia's history starts in 1865, when engineer Fredrik Idestam established a wood-pulp mill in southern Finland and started manufacturing paper. Due to the European industrialization and the growing consumption of paper and cardboard Nokia soon became successful. In 1895 Fredrik Idestam handed over the reins of the company to his son-in-law Gustaf Fogelholm.
Nokia's products were exported first to Russia and then to the UK and France. The Nokia factory attracted a large workforce and a small community grew up around it. A community called Nokia still exists on the riverbank of Emäkoski in southern Finland.
The Nokia Community attracts other Companies
The hydroelectricity (from the river Emäkoski) which the wood-pulp mill used also attracted the Finnish Rubber Works to establish a factory in Nokia. In the 1920s, the Rubber Works started to use Nokia as their brand name. In addition to footwear (galoshes) and tyres, the company later went on to manufacture rubber bands, industrial parts and raincoats.
Expanding into Electronics
After World War II the Finnish Rubber Works bought the majority of the Finnish Cable Works shares. The Finnish Cable Works was a company that had grown quickly due to the increasing need for power transmission and telegraph and telephone networks. Gradually the ownership of the Rubber Works and the Cable Works companies consolidated. In 1967 the companies were merged to form the Nokia Group (link to Nokia company logos).
The Finnish Cable Works had manufactured cables for telegraph and telephone networks and in the 1960 they establishmed the Cable Works´Electronics department. At this time the seeds of Nokia's global success in telecommunications were planted. In 1967, when the Nokia Group was formed, Electronic ...