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Google Is in Talks to Buy Nokia's Airborne Broadband System: Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)

Posted by msmash on from the up-next dept.

Google is in advanced talks to buy Nokia's airborne broadband system, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. Google would use Nokia's system, the report claimed, to tap into new services and reach more users by offering in-flight high-speed internet. From the report: Nokia's technology could help Google offer a faster alternative to existing Wi-Fi on airplanes, said the people. Talks are advanced and an agreement may be reached soon, the people said. A final decision hasn't been made and the companies could still decide against a deal, the people said. Nokia's LTE A2G cellular-based system creates a direct link between an aircraft and the ground instead of bouncing the signal off of a satellite, enabling in-cabin high-speed internet services using Wi-Fi, according to its website.

12 comments

  1. Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    They were the first love of nearly everyone here in Germany, and de facto the only phone brand people bought. And deserved too.

    We didn't even know about its networks division. We started to, when Microsoft brutally rapemurdered Nokia when they were at their weakest.

    Most people don't know how many smart and wonderful engineers worked at Nokia. But they should.

    So news like this make me happy, in this world of cancer and psychopaths herding morons and shit. Scratch that last part.

    (Please don't ruin it, commenters.)

    1. Re:Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by boundandgaggedwomen · · Score: 1

      They were the first love of nearly everyone here in Germany, and de facto the only phone brand people bought. And deserved too.

      We didn't even know about its networks division. We started to, when Microsoft brutally rapemurdered Nokia when they were at their weakest.

      Most people don't know how many smart and wonderful engineers worked at Nokia. But they should.

      So news like this make me happy, in this world of cancer and psychopaths herding morons and shit. Scratch that last part.

      (Please don't ruin it, commenters.)

      Most likely, Google will ruin this and shut it down like most of their buyouts!

    2. Re:Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Most people don't know how many smart and wonderful engineers worked at Nokia. But they should.

      Those were the same engineers that failed to deliver in the 5 years prior to Elop that sent their share price into freefall? those engineers and the management at the time are why Nokia got murder raped.

    3. Re:Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Is this HMD Global? I know they're selling Nokia smartphones now. And, thank god, they are actually releasing some in the lower end. And they actually seem decent (the Nokia 2 has a much needed auto-focus camera).

    4. Re:Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by whizzter · · Score: 2

      The engineers were great, at making hardware and embedded software to run on memory constrained system like their cheaper phone models.

      I'm sure some people internally said in 2004-2007 that they needed a new OS since they were basically running a macOS8/win3.1 like operating system on phones that had better specs than most win95 machines had used when the internet became a thing, but the thing was that Nokia's culture was not one that could appreciate the need for something like that in the future because the higher rungs were full of salesmen or other risk averse people that usually climbs in big organisations like Nokia was.

      (I'm not familiar with Nokia history so maybe they had some teams on that but then they did the whole Copland thing that Apple had done in the 90s)

    5. Re:Nice to see Nokia still doing nice things. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Is this HMD Global?...

      Nope.
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia

  2. Could be worse. Could be MS. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Nokia developers will just gather and make something new. Like the last time. Itâ(TM)s in their genes. Ever since they started making something else besides tires.

    1. Re:Could be worse. Could be MS. by blackpig · · Score: 1

      I have the new Nokia 8 (Android) phone and I must say that I'm very pleased with it.

    2. Re:Could be worse. Could be MS. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      how it differs fundamentally from the other android legion?

  3. Not the name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I am sure Bloomberg is not the name of the Nokia's system.

  4. Google spying in the air... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Capturing your devices MAC address, and what ever else....