Las Vegas, NV, USA - Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo told attendees at the International ConsumerElectronics Show that the world's developing economies are places of increasingopportunity and upward mobility, where wealth is being created at an incrediblerate and business opportunities abound - in part due to the spread of mobilecommunications.
"Mobile communicationshave played a big role in bringing hope and higher living standards toliterally billions of people," Kallasvuo said during a keynote speech Friday. "Thetrend promises to accelerate in the coming decade, as the power andcapabilities of smartphones spread across the globe."
Kallasvuo discussed howinnovators, particularly software developers, can join Nokia in its efforts tobe a force for good by helping to accelerate development in these growthmarkets. He announced the USD 1 million Nokia Growth Economy Venture Challenge - a USD 1 million investment from Nokia to encourage innovators and developersto come up with innovate ways to help people and promote upward mobility aroundthe world.
"We've seen what thetech community can do when it focuses on problems that are also opportunities,"Kallasvuo said. "We want to channel that energy toward improving lives in thedeveloping world."
Kallasvuo noted thatthere are about 4.6 billion mobile subscriptions among the planet's 6.8 billionpeople today. "For the majority of the world's people, their first and onlyaccess to the Internet will be through a mobile device - not a PC. And thisaccess is spreading very, very fast."
"In China, every monthmore than 7 million people gain access to the Internet for the first time, andmostly on mobile devices," he said. "This trend shows no signs of slowing. Themobile device has become a necessity for upward mobility."
Kallasvuo announcedthat Ovi Mail, Nokia's mobile email service that is designed for users whosefirst email access is via a mobile device, signed up more than 5 millionaccounts in its first year, exceeding the first-year user totals for Gmail,Yahoo Mail and Hotmail.
Kallasvuo spoke of theimportance of understanding every market in which a company does business.
"Business people oftentend to lump all of the growing countries outside the West into onecategory. They call them 'developingcountries,' 'emerging countries' or 'emerging markets.' Each of these markets is uniquely differentand complex. A one-size-fits-all approach just doesn't work."
Kallasvuo shared theCES stage with Jan Chipchase, whom he described as the "Indiana Jones ofNokia." Chipchase travels the far corners of the world to help Nokia understandhow people live and how mobile phones might help them to live better.
"People around theworld have shown us that adversity leads to real innovation," said Chipchase. "Peoplein some of the world's most remote and poorest countries have inspired us andamazed us. They know what they need and they find ways to make it happen."
After Chipchase,Kallasvuo introduced the "Progress Project" and Frances Linzee Gordon, one ofthe Lonely Planet travel journalists who worked on it. For the ProgressProject, Nokia invited Lonely Planet to investigate the benefits of mobility,giving complete editorial freedom to Lonely Planet's writers. What resulted wasa series of short videos that showed how lives are being improved by mobility.
"My first misconceptionabout this project, was that Progress was merely about technology," LinzeeGordon said. "In fact, it was really all about people. How people are usingmobile devices to improve their health, wealth, business and education. Mysecond misconception? Before this project, like a lot of people, I didn'tappreciate the potential for a global company to be a force for good."
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