Nokia to sell and lease back its headquarters

FINNISH PHONE MAKER Nokia has announced plans to sell and lease back its head office in Espoo, Finland.

The firm said on Tuesday that it plans to sell its Espoo headquarters to Finnish real estate company Exilion for €170m, before leasing it back on a "long term basis". This is part of the company's drive to sell off assets as it continues to struggle against IOS and Android in the smartphone market.

Nokia CFO Timo Ihamuotila said, "We had a comprehensive sales process with both Finnish and foreign investors and we are very pleased with this outcome.

"As we have said before, owning real estate is not part of Nokia's core business and when good opportunities arise we are willing to exit these types of non-core assets.

"We are naturally continuing to operate in our head office building on a long-term basis," he added.

Things might be about to get better for the struggling Finnish phone maker, though. According to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Windows Phone handsets are selling four times faster than they were last year.

Nokia could be about to get some cash from rival Research in Motion (RIM) too. The firm has won an arbitration ruling against the Blackberry maker that RIM infringes Nokia's wireless patents. µ