Nokia Explores Merger, Sales Opportunities

Nokia is exploring merger possibilities, asset sales, and other moves, Bloomberg reported Wednesday. Why I spit out my coffee reading that: Nokia is one of the top three manufacturers of 5G networking equipment. The H1 2019 breakdown, per Dell'Oro Group:

• Huawei captured 28.1% of telecom equipment market share.
• Nokia had 15.7%.
• Ericsson, 13.1%.

China's Huawei widened its lead over Finland's Nokia and Sweden's Ericsson by selling soup-to-nuts networking solutions on the cheap. Despite the U.S.' best efforts, it doesn't seem like Huawei will lose its pole position any time soon.

One possible future for Nokia is a merger with Nordic frenemy Ericsson. But that would invite antitrust scrutiny. Tech companies, wireless carriers, and Waystar Royco could also be potential buyers.

Big picture: Maybe a rising 5G tide doesn't lift all boats. Just as countries begin wide-scale 5G rollouts, the already narrow telco equipment field could shrink even more.