Nokia reported Q3 revenue of EUR 5.399 billion, up 2% over EUR 5.294 billion in sales for the same period last year. Sales were contrained by expected supply chain and Mobile Networks North America headwinds. Comparable diluted EPS of EUR 0.08; reported diluted EPS of EUR 0.06.
Pekka Lundmark, President and CEO of Nokia, states: "We delivered another great quarter driven by our increased investments in technology leadership and strong market demand. The highlight of the quarter was the launch of our next generation FP5 IP routing silicon – delivering up to three times more capacity while reducing power consumption by up to 75% per bit compared to previous generation. This will help reduce the carbon footprint of both Nokia and our customers, while also helping customers to manage their operating expenses."
"The third quarter saw us achieve 2% constant currency net sales growth despite the impact of earlier communicated headwinds in North America for Mobile Networks and global supply chain constraints. These headwinds were offset by strong growth in Network Infrastructure against a tough year-on-year comparison and by Cloud and Network Services achieving double-digit growth. Our comparable operating margin for the quarter was 11.7%, which is a further testament to the accountability and financial discipline that our new operating model is driving through the organization.
"We now have over 380 private wireless customers and the business continues to grow strongly. We are further increasing our investment to ensure we maintain the lead we have built with the industry’s most complete offering.
"Overall, I am pleased with our strong financial performance in 2021 so far. We continue to expect seasonality to be less pronounced this year than previously and are reiterating our full year 2021 outlook. Considering our continued strength, we now expect to be towards the upper-end of our comparable operating margin range. As we look ahead, we believe we are well positioned to capitalize on strong demand in our end markets through strengthened technology leadership and improved cost competitiveness. However, the uncertainty around the global semiconductor market limits our visibility into Q4 and 2022. We are working closely not only with our suppliers to ensure component availability but also with our customers to ensure we can meet their needs and mitigate the unprecedented component cost inflation our industry faces. Coupled with the one-offs we’ve benefited from this year, this may limit our margin expansion potential in 2022."
