Today, it does. In a manic market, the noise surrounding 3G is every bit as grisly as the soundtrack of Scream 3 . Such stampedes throw plenty of dust on Nokia. For now, though, the Finns' drive to build and dominate the mobile Web is not even off schedule. And the telcos, battered as they are, remain committed to 3G. Most of them are locked in, by the terms of their spectrum licenses, and ready to plow ahead.
Hazards lurk up ahead, though.
This process is known as digital convergence. For Niklas Savander, Nokia's mission is like that of a surfer looking for the next wave. Savander, Nokia's vice-president for software applications, says that with mobile voice, Nokia caught a tsunami in the '90s. The first company to design colorful phones and build a consumer brand, Nokia left competitors such as Motorola and Ericsson floundering in its wake. Those engineering companies viewed mobile phones for far too long as boring and expensive business tools.