Interview: the man who led Nokia’s charge into Asia

The author, Shiwen, is a part-time freelance writer, aspiring entrepreneur and overall generalist interested in exploring, researching and writing.

Headquartered in Singapore and with over 37 million registered users in all its networks spread across 164 countries, YuuZoo markets itself as the next generation of social networks powered by the surge of smartphones around the world.

A relatively young company dating back to 2008, it will be listed on the Singapore Exchange through a reverse takeover for S$490 million ($383 million).

But the story of YuuZoo is also intertwined with that its chairman, co-founder and CEO, Thomas Henrik Zilliacus, who has been involved in the world of mobile telecommunications for over 30 years, starting with Nokia in 1980.

From 1980 to 1996, he oversaw corporate communications, public relations and branding in both Finland and the Asia-Pacific. His involvement with the Nokia legacy continues on, through his role as the Chairman of the Board of Singapore-based Newkia, a firm made up of ex-Nokia employees that wants to make Nokia-like Android phones.

At the YuuZoo office on Beach Road, Singapore, he shared part of his story with Tech in Asia, as well as on developments in YuuZoo that led to the reverse takeover.

Tech in Asia: What got you so deeply involved in mobile telecommunications?

Ziliacus: Well, I didn’t choose telecommunications so much as it chose me. I was in Finland in the late 1970s, when there was a big generational shift in society due to the demographics of the time. We ended up with a lot of people in their late 20’s becoming government ministers, civil service officials and corporate executives. Nokia followed suit and they hired me.

Nokia was originally a conglomerate with several divisions and product lines, such as a rubber division which made rubber boots. I was initially reluctant as I didn’t want to have a career selling rubber boots but the CEO at the time explained to me the new direction of Nokia and recruited me as global head of Nokia’s corporate brand, marketing and PR.

Nokia is actually the name of a city in Finland, where the Nokia Corporation was founded in 1876. It was my paternal grandmother’s uncle that actually founded Nokia, Fredrik Idestam. Nokia was originally a paper company, which then merged with a rubber company and later a cable company. And out of that grew the telecoms and mobile business.

What was your first major project with Nokia?

One of the first was the marketing campaign that penetrated the Swedish market. We went into Sweden with a novel campaign idea where we did not tell our name at the beginning of the massive campaign.

Instead, we asked questions such as “which rubber boots company also is a leading player in telecommunications?”, then followed a week later with an equally massive campaign saying only: “The answer: Nokia”. Our brand recognition went from zero to very high numbers literally overnight.