Speaker 1: Get in text with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff Works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer here
Speaker 1: at How Stuff Works not Love Things Tech, and today
Speaker 1: we're going to do a listener request. Listener Marcus wrote
Speaker 1: in and asked that I do an episode about Nokia.
Speaker 1: I thought it was high time I tackled the subject,
Speaker 1: and here we go, because it's pretty cool. And by
Speaker 1: the way, there are a lot of different ways of
Speaker 1: pronouncing this company. I've definitely heard Nokia a lot more
Speaker 1: frequently than Nokia, and I've heard Nokia. I've heard lots
Speaker 1: of different variations. It seems that no matter which one
Speaker 1: I pick, I'm wrong. I'm just accepting that. So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go with Nakia, knowing that I'm wrong. So I've
Speaker 1: saved you the trouble of writing in You're welcome. Now,
Speaker 1: before I jump into the story of Nakia, I want
Speaker 1: to get you guys a little bit of an anecdote.
Speaker 1: My memory is not the best. Anyone who knows me
Speaker 1: knows that's an understatement, but as best I can tell,
Speaker 1: my first cell phone was a Knockia twenty one. That
Speaker 1: model came out in two thousand three. Now it's possible
Speaker 1: that I had a Knackia eighty two ten. That one
Speaker 1: came out in nine That was the really colorful one.
Speaker 1: You could actually pop the covers off and replace it
Speaker 1: with other covers. They had I think six different colors
Speaker 1: when it first came out, and then there were a
Speaker 1: bunch of third party ones that other ones with crazy designs,
Speaker 1: But I honestly cannot remember. So it's possible that I
Speaker 1: just saw the Nakia eighty two tens everywhere, but I
Speaker 1: didn't actually own one. Cell Phones had been around in
Speaker 1: the general consumer population for a few years before I
Speaker 1: ever got ahold of one. I remember there were classmates
Speaker 1: of mine in college who had cell phones, and I
Speaker 1: kept on thinking, why the heck would I want people
Speaker 1: to be able to reach me whenever and wherever I was.
Speaker 1: And it took me a few years to break down
Speaker 1: and get one. And of course now I have separation
Speaker 1: anxiety if I am not constantly in close proximity to
Speaker 1: my cell phone. But I never once thought to look
Speaker 1: into the company that made my first cell phone. I
Speaker 1: just assumed it was a Japanese company out of Sheer ignorance.
Speaker 1: I thought, oh, it's no Kia. That sounds like it
Speaker 1: could be a company from Japan, I suppose, And I
Speaker 1: never really thought anything more of it, which was ridiculous,
Speaker 1: of course, and again it was due to my own ignorance.
Speaker 1: So I did find out eventually that it was a
Speaker 1: company in Finland many years later. In fact, it might
Speaker 1: have been after I had started working here and how
Speaker 1: stuff works, which was back in two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: so quite late in the game as it were. I
Speaker 1: just wasn't really paying attention to mobile handset news, and
Speaker 1: until I did the research for the show, I had
Speaker 1: just assumed that Nakia was a relatively young company, perhaps
Speaker 1: with a background that stretched back maybe to the late
Speaker 1: eighties maybe mid eight knees and started in electronics, then
Speaker 1: work their way to cellular phones. But I was so
Speaker 1: incredibly wrong. And this, my friends, is the biggest reason
Speaker 1: that I love my job. I get to learn stuff
Speaker 1: and push back my own ignorance, which is exciting to me,
Speaker 1: to actually learn new things, and then to share what
Speaker 1: I've learned. Though I'm sure a lot of you will
Speaker 1: be familiar with elements of this story that I'm going
Speaker 1: to tell today, but maybe some of it will come
Speaker 1: as a surprise to you as well, and I hope
Speaker 1: you also take delight in that. So our story begins
Speaker 1: in eighteen thirty eight Finland with an engineer named Newt
Speaker 1: Frederick Edmund, later known as Frederick Idistan. And I know
Speaker 1: also I'm going to butcher the pronunciation of these Finnish names,
Speaker 1: and I apologize profusely for that. Uh Is Stem actually
Speaker 1: took his the last name of his uncle who adopted him. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm not about to tell you that a Finish in
Speaker 1: ter created the cell phone in the mid nineteenth century
Speaker 1: in Finland. That would be ridiculous because who would he call.
Speaker 1: But it Is Stem would become the founder of the
Speaker 1: company that evolved into Nokia. It Is Stem followed in
Speaker 1: the footsteps of his father, who was a mining engineer,
Speaker 1: and he earned a master's degree in engineering and had
Speaker 1: planned on applying for employment with the Board of Minds
Speaker 1: of the Grand Duchy of Finland as a civil servant.
Speaker 1: Quick history lesson. At this time, Finland was technically part
Speaker 1: of the Russian Empire, but it was semi autonomous and
Speaker 1: got to operate as what was called the Grand Duchy
Speaker 1: of Finland before that it had been part of Sweden.
Speaker 1: So the geography and political nature will play into this
Speaker 1: story quite a bit as well. So it's it's good
Speaker 1: to have that that basic understanding. While Frederick was pursuing
Speaker 1: more education in the field of metal or in Germany,
Speaker 1: while attending the School of Minds in Friedburg, Saxony, he
Speaker 1: went on a little field trip and he visited what
Speaker 1: was called a groundwood mill, which took wood and turned
Speaker 1: it into the raw materials for paper. So, first of all, cool,
Speaker 1: and second of all, yeah, I get to talk about
Speaker 1: paper mills. Now that might sound weird that I'm actually
Speaker 1: excited to talk about paper mills, but here's the thing.
Speaker 1: I grew up around paper mills when I was a
Speaker 1: little kid, and the smell is memorable because paper mills
Speaker 1: these days typically use a chemical treatment on the wood
Speaker 1: pulp to turn it into paper. Uh. I should also
Speaker 1: mention that I grew up also around poultry farms, and
Speaker 1: the mixture of smells when the wind blew just right
Speaker 1: of poultry farms and paper mills meant that I had
Speaker 1: a tough childhood. Guys, at least as far as the
Speaker 1: old factory system is concerned. Anyway, the paper mill. It
Speaker 1: is them that did was built to take advantage of
Speaker 1: the work of two innovators, Friedrich gottlub Killer and Heinrich Filter.
Speaker 1: Keller had received a pattern in eighteen forty six for
Speaker 1: his method of making paper from wood fiber mash, and
Speaker 1: Filter developed this approach to make mass production of paper
Speaker 1: a possibility. Until then, paper had been made from rags
Speaker 1: pretty much by hand. And this type of paper, sometimes
Speaker 1: called cotton paper, has some nice features to it that
Speaker 1: makes its superior in many ways to wood pulp paper.
Speaker 1: For example, it takes ink really well and it's far
Speaker 1: more durable than well woodpulpa based paper. But it was
Speaker 1: a laborious process and it was hard to make a
Speaker 1: lot of it in a short amount of time. So
Speaker 1: here's how the old style paper was made, because I
Speaker 1: think this is fascinating, and to be fair, there's still
Speaker 1: paper that's made this way. First, you would take some rags,
Speaker 1: perhaps from clothing that had been worn out during usefulness,
Speaker 1: usually made from something like linen. Later on cotton became popular,
Speaker 1: but before the the shipments came back from the New
Speaker 1: World with cotton, linen was the primary type of textile
Speaker 1: material during medieval times, you would actually have a guy
Speaker 1: who would go around essentially door to door, collecting old
Speaker 1: linen clothing from people after the clothing had been worn out.
Speaker 1: He was also typically the same guy who would collect bones,
Speaker 1: usually animal bones, to be ground down for fertilizer, and
Speaker 1: that local dude became known as the rag and bone man.
Speaker 1: So if you've heard the phrase rag and bone man,
Speaker 1: that's where it comes from. You're only human, after all,
Speaker 1: don't put the blame on me. The linen was prime
Speaker 1: material for paper pulp. You just had to prepare it first,
Speaker 1: so workers at the paper mill would use a knife
Speaker 1: to tear the linen clothing into smaller strips. They would
Speaker 1: dunk those strips into a vat filled with water and
Speaker 1: let it soak for a couple of days, and after
Speaker 1: that they would take the soggy mess and lay it
Speaker 1: in a trough. Now in Germany, it became common practice
Speaker 1: to use huge, heavy wooden hammers that were driven by
Speaker 1: a water wheel device to just lift up and smash
Speaker 1: down over and over again, smashing the soggy mess until
Speaker 1: it becomes pulp. At that point, you would transfer the
Speaker 1: pulp into a vat and workers would dip a frame
Speaker 1: with parallel wires, kind of a sieve strung across this
Speaker 1: uh this frame, and they would gather up pulp and
Speaker 1: they would pour out any excess pulp, and they would
Speaker 1: make sure they had a nice, relatively flat layer of pulp.
Speaker 1: They'd swished the frames around a bit, and they would
Speaker 1: gently lay out a sheet of soggy wet paper against
Speaker 1: a layer of cloth, and then they would cover it
Speaker 1: up with another layer of cloth. They would repeat the process,
Speaker 1: having kind of a sandwich of cloth and paper this way.
Speaker 1: I watched the video of a man in India who
Speaker 1: uses this old method all by hands, swishing the pulp
Speaker 1: in the frame, almost like he was inning for gold.
Speaker 1: It's what it reminded me of. So what's happening on
Speaker 1: a microscopic basis, Well, imagine pulp as a huge mass
Speaker 1: of tiny strings, and this is true for pulp from
Speaker 1: rags or from wood. Processing pulp makes the strings hairy,
Speaker 1: meaning it a braids the edges it created, makes them uneven.
Speaker 1: That encourages the various fibers to bind together. And it's
Speaker 1: that binding process that creates sheets of paper. Now let's
Speaker 1: go back to the medieval paper mill. Now, eventually they
Speaker 1: would move a pile of these soggy sheets that were
Speaker 1: pressed between layers of cloth over to a press machine.
Speaker 1: So you've got a flat press and a screw top,
Speaker 1: and by turning the screw top, it brings the press
Speaker 1: down and squeezes everything underneath it right well, in this case,
Speaker 1: they would use it to squeeze most of the water
Speaker 1: out of the sheets of paper, and then they would
Speaker 1: hang up the sheets of paper to dry out the
Speaker 1: rest of the way. The parallel wires of the frames
Speaker 1: would create create a ribbed pattern on the paper, and
Speaker 1: that type of paper became known as laid paper. By
Speaker 1: the time Frederick it Istan was visiting a paper mill,
Speaker 1: a new type of paper was beginning to emerge. The
Speaker 1: paper makers started using what they called a wove mold,
Speaker 1: meaning the frames they were using actually had a tightly
Speaker 1: woven sieve of wires that criss crossed each other in
Speaker 1: a grid rather than just parallel. That created a paper
Speaker 1: that was easier to write on it made it more legible,
Speaker 1: is considered superior to the laid paper approach. In the
Speaker 1: seventeenth century, in Holland, engineers created a device casually called
Speaker 1: a hollander that made this process a little easier. It
Speaker 1: had a tub that you would fill with rags and water,
Speaker 1: and you would use a set of rotating blades connected
Speaker 1: to some form of gear work that would harness a
Speaker 1: natural source of power. So you might have a windmill
Speaker 1: and you're harnessing wind power, or you might have a
Speaker 1: water wheel and you're harnessing water power. This sped things
Speaker 1: up a bit, but everyone was still using rags to
Speaker 1: create paper at that time. The wood pulp advancements that
Speaker 1: Keller and Filter created change things significantly, and in a
Speaker 1: moment will explore how a wood pulp paper mill worked
Speaker 1: back in the nineteenth century. But first let's take a
Speaker 1: quick break to thank our sponsor. Alright, So how does
Speaker 1: a wood pulp paper mill work. The earliest wood pulp
Speaker 1: mills used mechanical force to turn wood into pulp. So
Speaker 1: you would chop down trees. Then you would cut the
Speaker 1: trees up into small logs called bolts. The bolts would
Speaker 1: go through grinders made out of stone, typically sandstone, and
Speaker 1: you would use some form of of power to turn
Speaker 1: these grinders. You would typically have a water wheel, or
Speaker 1: maybe you would use human or animal power, but more
Speaker 1: frequently than not, you would use water wheels, just because
Speaker 1: you needed that that hydro power to really turn these
Speaker 1: massive stones, and the grinders would crush the bolts into pulp,
Speaker 1: which would be soaked and then poured into the paper
Speaker 1: molds to form sheets of paper. Wood pulp paper was
Speaker 1: less durable than rag paper, and it didn't take ink
Speaker 1: quite as well, so before paper makers learned how to
Speaker 1: treat the wood with various chemicals to improve the quality
Speaker 1: of paper, it was pretty brittle and had a tendency
Speaker 1: to turn yellow after just a couple of days, but
Speaker 1: did lend itself to mass manufacture in a way that
Speaker 1: rag paper didn't, and it was relatively cheap to produce,
Speaker 1: so while it was arguably an inferior paper, it was
Speaker 1: easier to produce in the quantities that were in demand.
Speaker 1: This was also a time in history when literacy was
Speaker 1: on the rise. The Industrial Revolution was giving people an
Speaker 1: opportunity to have more time to themselves, which they filled
Speaker 1: with various activities such as reading. Frederick took this newfound
Speaker 1: knowledge of paper mills back to his homeland of Finland.
Speaker 1: Finland seemed like the perfect place to establish a wood
Speaker 1: pulp paper mill. The country had enormous forests, and no
Speaker 1: shortage of fast flowing rivers, so locating a mill along
Speaker 1: the river to use the water as a power source
Speaker 1: and harvesting the lumber from the vast forests seemed like
Speaker 1: a perfect opportunity. Frederick ordered machines from Germany designed by
Speaker 1: Felter himself, to install such a paper mill in his
Speaker 1: home country. The applied for a permit to operate such
Speaker 1: a business, and the Finish Senate approved the permit on
Speaker 1: May twelfth, eighteen sixty five, and Nokia traces back their
Speaker 1: history to that very day. The mill took time to
Speaker 1: build and bring up to operational status, but it began
Speaker 1: producing paper commercially in eighteen sixty six. Frederick located his
Speaker 1: first mill in Tampere, near the Tamarkowski Rapids, and his
Speaker 1: venture succeeded where other entrepreneurs in Finland had failed. Felters
Speaker 1: technology was proven to be effective. Now Frederick had to
Speaker 1: devote as much energy to promoting paper as he did
Speaker 1: in bringing the technology to Finland. The general consensus was
Speaker 1: that would pulp paper just wasn't very good, but Frederick
Speaker 1: kept at it and experimented with papers made from a
Speaker 1: collection of rag and wood pulp fibers, so he started
Speaker 1: combining the two. In eighteen sixty seven, at the Paris Exhibition,
Speaker 1: he brought home the bronze medal. After demonstrating his groundwood
Speaker 1: pulp Felter's mill received a gold medal, so this was
Speaker 1: seen as an endorsement that helped propel would pulp paper
Speaker 1: into common use. In eighteen sixty eight, Frederick built a
Speaker 1: second paper mill. This time he chose a location called Nakia,
Speaker 1: which was built along a river called Nakia, and that
Speaker 1: river provided a much better source of hydro power. It
Speaker 1: was just a stronger flowing river. So he formed a
Speaker 1: partnership with his friend Leo Michelin or sometimes Leo Mechelein
Speaker 1: to create a shared company and they called it Nokia
Speaker 1: AB or ab a b is what that stands for anyway,
Speaker 1: This was the birth of the Nokia name. Leo Michelin,
Speaker 1: by the way, was a remarkable man in his own right.
Speaker 1: He earned degrees in literature, esthetics, and jurisprudence, so he
Speaker 1: had the opportunity to become a lawyer, but instead became
Speaker 1: a professor and he continued studies in economics at the
Speaker 1: same time. He also later became a member of Parliament
Speaker 1: for the Swedish People's Party and was known as a
Speaker 1: liberal reformer who worked hard to create a strong Finnish economy.
Speaker 1: When Russia began to put the screws to the Grand
Speaker 1: Duchy of Finland, which again was technically part of the
Speaker 1: Russian Empire at that time, Michelin advocated passive resistance as
Speaker 1: a means to protest Russia's policies. Quake historic note here
Speaker 1: Finland again was originally part of Sweden. In the early
Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds, during the Finnish War, Russian Russian forces rested
Speaker 1: Finland away from Sweden. Incorporated into the Russian Empire, Finland
Speaker 1: was able to maintain a good, good deal of a nomy,
Speaker 1: unlike a lot of Russian territories. And now back to Michelin.
Speaker 1: He was exiled for his actions for recommending this passive resistance,
Speaker 1: and he was later allowed back in because he was
Speaker 1: actually voted into parliament. So once he was voted in
Speaker 1: as a member of parliament, the country said, well, I
Speaker 1: guess we can't really keep you banished. You represent the people,
Speaker 1: so come on back. In eighteen seventy one, Frederick and
Speaker 1: Michelin transformed Nakia ab into Nakia Limited, creating a share company,
Speaker 1: and as the name implies, this is a company in
Speaker 1: which investors purchase shares or a percentage of the ownership
Speaker 1: of the company. Essentially, Nachia was becoming a publicly traded company,
Speaker 1: though in those early days it wasn't on a public
Speaker 1: stock exchange. Michelin purchased an estate called Nakia Manner, which
Speaker 1: included property along the Nakia Rapids, and all of those
Speaker 1: assets became part of Nakia Limited. So while Michelin made
Speaker 1: the purchases, he ended up incorporating that as part of
Speaker 1: the company, and they started having their headquarters in this
Speaker 1: manor house, and the waterfalls that were adjacent to the
Speaker 1: manor house were considered part of their property. They actually
Speaker 1: owned the waterfall. In eight five, the company built the
Speaker 1: first sulfite pulp mill in Finland. This took a different
Speaker 1: approach than the mechanical mills that had used physical force
Speaker 1: to break down the wood into pulp. Now there was
Speaker 1: a chemical process in the mix. So let me explain
Speaker 1: that first you need sulfurus acid, not sulfuric, but sulfur us.
Speaker 1: The mill could produce this by taking sulfur and burning
Speaker 1: it with just the right amount of oxygen, which would
Speaker 1: create create sulfur dioxide. They would then use water to
Speaker 1: absorb the sulfur dioxide, which creates sulfurus acid. Then you
Speaker 1: add in some carbonates or hydroxides as counter ions, and
Speaker 1: you pour this pulping liquid into a bowl. Boiler. Now,
Speaker 1: double boiler is a device in which you have one
Speaker 1: container located inside a second container, and around that that
Speaker 1: first container, the inner one, you have water. So you've
Speaker 1: got second container, you've got water. Then you have the
Speaker 1: first container inside all of that, and you heat up
Speaker 1: the second container so that it boils the water and
Speaker 1: that in turn heats up the first container. And double
Speaker 1: boilers are common for lots of different things, including cooking.
Speaker 1: You may have created a double boiler, especially if you
Speaker 1: were working with something like trying to melt chocolate. Well,
Speaker 1: you would mix in wood pulp and allow the wood
Speaker 1: pulp and this mixture, the sulfurous acid mixture to mush together.
Speaker 1: The the actual device that this stuff was in. We're
Speaker 1: called digesters, so you can think of it as digesting
Speaker 1: this wood pulp for several hours at high temperatures, typically
Speaker 1: somewhere between a hundred thirty and a hundred six degrees
Speaker 1: celsius or between two sixty six to three twenty degrees fahrenheit.
Speaker 1: The pulping liquid extracts a material called lignant from the wood.
Speaker 1: This is something that provides structural support in the cells
Speaker 1: inside wood pulp. After its time in the digesters, the
Speaker 1: treated pulp would be washed to remove the chemicals and
Speaker 1: the degraded lignant that was leached from this stuff, and
Speaker 1: the pulp could then be used to create paper or
Speaker 1: combined with other pulps and then used to create paper.
Speaker 1: The paper business was progressing well and Michelin began to
Speaker 1: urge Frederick that the company should diversify and get into
Speaker 1: other businesses. He was specifically thinking about creating an electricity
Speaker 1: power plant because they were right next to this river,
Speaker 1: they said. He said, this is perfect. We can use
Speaker 1: the river to help turn a generator and generate electricity.
Speaker 1: But Frederick was not on the same page. That's a
Speaker 1: paper putt, and he refused, so he said not as
Speaker 1: long as I'm alive now. He ended up retiring in
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety six and Michelin would assume the role of
Speaker 1: Nakia ABS chairman and he began laying the groundwork for
Speaker 1: building out an electricity plant which was ready to go
Speaker 1: in nineteen o two. All right, so we're in the
Speaker 1: home stretch for the origin of Nakia to talk a
Speaker 1: little bit more about what happened in those early days.
Speaker 1: But before I jump into this last segment, let's take
Speaker 1: a quick break to thank our sponsor. Now we need
Speaker 1: to switch gears a bit and talk about another Finnish
Speaker 1: entrepreneur and the business he founded. The businessman's name was
Speaker 1: Edward Polonne. He was the son of a police chief.
Speaker 1: He had earned himself a law degree, and he worked
Speaker 1: as a lawyer and a civil servant in Finland's prison administration.
Speaker 1: That's fun. Edward joined several other business owners to create
Speaker 1: a new company that was called the Finish Rubber Works Limited.
Speaker 1: Actually has a much longer name and Finish that I
Speaker 1: cannot possibly pronounce, so I'm not even going to try it,
Speaker 1: but in English Finnish Rubber Works Limited. And someday I'll
Speaker 1: have to do a full episode about the role that
Speaker 1: rubber played in industrialization and how it's discovery led to
Speaker 1: massive trauma in the Amazon, both for indigenous people's in fact,
Speaker 1: mainly for them who called the area of their home
Speaker 1: and to the Europeans who were seeking out a way
Speaker 1: to make a fortune, thousands of whom died in the process.
Speaker 1: But we'll sum it up here to say that in
Speaker 1: the late nineteenth century, rubber was in demand and it
Speaker 1: was being used for many different things, including waterproof boots.
Speaker 1: Galoshes became the Finnish rubber company's chief product, something that
Speaker 1: Nokia still makes to this day. In nineteen four the
Speaker 1: company relocated its headquarters from Helsinki to the town of Nokia.
Speaker 1: The move was necessary in order to grow as a company.
Speaker 1: There just wasn't much room min Helsinki for the expansion,
Speaker 1: and Nokia had a ready workforce and the river was
Speaker 1: a steady source of hydro power. Also, the electricity generator
Speaker 1: from Nokia AB was a great resource. So why do
Speaker 1: I bring that up. It's because in nineteen eighteen, this
Speaker 1: rubber company acquired Nokia Limited, largely in order to get
Speaker 1: access to that hydro power that Nakia had at its disposal.
Speaker 1: Though these two companies would operate independently because at the
Speaker 1: time it was actually against the law for companies in
Speaker 1: different industries to merge together in Finland, so they could
Speaker 1: not operate as a single entity. Because it was illegal
Speaker 1: to do so. While the Rubber Company was growing and
Speaker 1: the Nokia paper and electricity businesses were doing well, another
Speaker 1: company was establishing itself in Finland, and that was a
Speaker 1: venture that was called the Finnish Cable Company. Again, the
Speaker 1: actual Finnish names are really long, and I would just
Speaker 1: butcher them if I attempted them. But it's the Finnish
Speaker 1: Cable Company and it was founded by Avid Wickstrom. His
Speaker 1: company produced telephone, telegraph and electrical cables. Cologne would lead
Speaker 1: an acquisition of that company in nineteen twenty two, bringing
Speaker 1: it under this conglomerate. So now you had three companies.
Speaker 1: You had the Rubber Company, you had the Finished Cable Company,
Speaker 1: and you had Nokia AB And he still had to
Speaker 1: run all three businesses independently of one another, though they
Speaker 1: were in this kind of conglomerate. Edward was the majority shareholder.
Speaker 1: The main businesses now were electricity generation, cable production, rubber manufacturing,
Speaker 1: and paper slash forestry goods. Pologne became the head of
Speaker 1: this new conglomerate and he led the way. Nine two
Speaker 1: would end up being a big year for lots of reasons,
Speaker 1: not just because this conglomerate formed That was also the
Speaker 1: year that Joseph Stalin established the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic,
Speaker 1: also known as the Soviet Union or U s s R.
Speaker 1: Finland had previously declared its independence from the Russian Empire
Speaker 1: back in nineteen seventeen after the Grand Duke Nicholas the
Speaker 1: Second abdicate at his authority as Emperor, ending the empirical
Speaker 1: rule of Russia. So you had the Emperor say all right,
Speaker 1: I'm out. You had Finland say all right. Then that
Speaker 1: means we're independent. Now you can't do anything about it,
Speaker 1: and Russia or Imperial Russia at that point that's crumbling
Speaker 1: around it said, you know, we've got bigger problems to
Speaker 1: worry about that in Finland. Now. I mentioned this because
Speaker 1: the Soviet Union would become one of Nokia's big customers
Speaker 1: after what could generously be described as an adversarial relationship
Speaker 1: with Finland. And now we have to jump into some
Speaker 1: World War two history to really understand how complicated this gets.
Speaker 1: On November thirtieth, nineteen thirty nine, the Soviet Union launched
Speaker 1: an attack on Finland with the intent to annex Finland
Speaker 1: back into the Soviet Union, thus negating Finland's declaration of
Speaker 1: independence in nineteen seventeen. The Finnish people had up to
Speaker 1: that point been divided about the conflict in Europe, whether
Speaker 1: some wanted to side with the Allies some of the
Speaker 1: access powers, but this attack managed to unify the country
Speaker 1: against the U. S. S R, which was part of
Speaker 1: the Allied forces. Now they weren't against all the Allies
Speaker 1: at this point, just against the U. S. S R.
Speaker 1: But finished resistance would end up being fierce, but the
Speaker 1: Soviets vastly outnumbered the Finns, and in nineteen forty the
Speaker 1: Finnish government had to sign a peace treaty. They ended
Speaker 1: up seeding much of Finland to the Soviet Union. This
Speaker 1: was later called the Winter War. Finland would try to
Speaker 1: seek out help as the Soviets continued to place pressure
Speaker 1: on the country, and they asked the Allies. They said,
Speaker 1: could you guys help? Sweden and Britain both said, hey,
Speaker 1: we really feel for you, but we've got our own
Speaker 1: stuff going on, and eventually they turned to Germany instead.
Speaker 1: Germany was of course eager to have a foothold from
Speaker 1: which it could launch an invasion into the Soviet Union,
Speaker 1: and so Finland would find itself allied with the Nazi
Speaker 1: Germany Powers and access Powers, and this began what was
Speaker 1: called the Continuation War in nineteen forty one. Finland was
Speaker 1: intent on retaking the lands it had lost at the
Speaker 1: end of the Winter War, and the conflict would stretch
Speaker 1: on until nineteen forty four. It went back and forth
Speaker 1: a few times UH and at that point there was
Speaker 1: an uneasy peace that was arrived at between the Soviet
Speaker 1: Union and Finland, and not much had changed territorially speaking
Speaker 1: from the end of the Winter War. Essentially we were
Speaker 1: back to where things were at the beginning of the conflict.
Speaker 1: In the fall of nineteen forty four, Finland turned against
Speaker 1: Germany and began fighting in the Lapland War. After the
Speaker 1: Soviet Union applied political and military pressure as codified in
Speaker 1: the Moscow Armistist So Finland was being told by the
Speaker 1: Soviet Union, you need to uh, you need to put
Speaker 1: up resistance against Germany. You need to kick out German
Speaker 1: troops from your country. You need to actually go on
Speaker 1: the offensive. You need to declare war against Germany. Finland
Speaker 1: wasn't really keen on this. The leader of Finland at
Speaker 1: the time was sort of sympathetic to Germany, and there
Speaker 1: was a reluctance to engage in warfare against a country
Speaker 1: that had previously been its ally. At the same time,
Speaker 1: the Soviet Union was saying, if you want this piece
Speaker 1: to hold, you will do what we say, and we
Speaker 1: outnumber you, so maybe you should start acting on that.
Speaker 1: So Finland officially began attacking German forces on September in
Speaker 1: the wake of the war. Once World War Two was over,
Speaker 1: Finland was forced to pay reparations to the Soviet Union. Essentially,
Speaker 1: the Allies said, your actions during the war put you
Speaker 1: more on the Axis side than the Allied side, and
Speaker 1: you owe the Soviet Union for all the different attacks
Speaker 1: you did. Even though the Soviet Union technically attacked Finland first,
Speaker 1: not all of Finland was suffering due to this relationship
Speaker 1: with the Soviet Union. For example, Nakia, Nakia's electricity generating
Speaker 1: business ended up doing quite well. The Soviet Union became
Speaker 1: one of Nakia's biggest customers, in fact, their primary customer.
Speaker 1: The Soviet Union would purchase electrical equipment, cables, manufacturing, machinery
Speaker 1: and more from Nakias. Nakia began to offer up more products,
Speaker 1: the Soviet Union began to purchase them that allowed Nakia
Speaker 1: to grow rapidly and expand, and that allowed them to
Speaker 1: pursue a new market, which was electronics. In nineteen sixty three,
Speaker 1: Nakia starts making radio telephones, mostly for the Finnish military,
Speaker 1: some for the Soviet military and for first responders. This
Speaker 1: would be the uh the still the conglomerate, right, there's
Speaker 1: not a company yet, it's a conglomerate of companies to
Speaker 1: dip its toe the first time that they would dip
Speaker 1: their toe in an industry that would later define the company.
Speaker 1: So in nineteen sixty seven, more than one hundred years
Speaker 1: after Frederick established his first paper mill, the three companies
Speaker 1: within the Nokia conglomerate formally merged together to create the
Speaker 1: Nakia Corporation. The company's businesses included electronics, rubber, cable, and lumber.
Speaker 1: It was poised to pursue opportunities in several spaces, including
Speaker 1: consumer electronics, and yet there was still no hint that
Speaker 1: this company would become a major player in the futuristic
Speaker 1: technology of portable cellular phones. Now, in the next episode,
Speaker 1: we're gonna pick up with the Nachia Corporation and talk
Speaker 1: about how it forged a pathway in electronics in general
Speaker 1: and cell phones in particular. Will also look at how
Speaker 1: the company ultimately made the decision to divest itself of
Speaker 1: nearly all of its businesses, including ultimately its mobile device division,
Speaker 1: which one could argue was the division that gave the
Speaker 1: company its global reach in the nineteen nineties. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: if you have suggestions for future episodes of tech Stuff,
Speaker 1: whether it's at technology, a company, personality, and tech. Maybe
Speaker 1: there's someone you would like to have on the show
Speaker 1: as a co host or someone I should interview, Please
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