CASE: SM-320(A)

DATE: 03/04/19

INTRAPRENEURSHIP @ NOKIA SOFTWARE:

INSTILLING CULTURE CHANGE

Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software, or I@NS, was a program created in 2017 to give Nokia
Software’s 10,000 employees the opportunity to submit ideas for products, services, or solutions
that delivered new capabilities, solved tough challenges faced by customers, or opened new
markets. The program was initiated by Ron Haberman, vice president at Nokia software
responsible for the Emerging Products Product Unit, which incubated and nurtured early-stage
businesses into fully established product units.

I@NS was intended to mimic the experience of founding a start-up, getting it funded, building a
product, and taking it to market, with all the potential risk and reward this entailed. Except, of
course, this particular start-up experience would occur within Nokia Corporation, a 150-year-old
global company with 103,000 employees working in more than 100 countries—a company that
described its mission as “creat[ing] the technology to connect the world.”1 Given this rather
unusual “start-up” environment, Haberman really had no idea how it would all unfold. As he
told colleagues from the outset:

This is a start-up. We do not know what’s gonna happen. We do not know how to
make it perfect. We don’t know what is the right way to do it. All we can do is
talk about it, find an approach that is somewhat reasonable, and try it out, and if it
doesn’t work, we’ll take a different approach next time.2

1
For more on Nokia Corporation, see:
https://www.nokia.com/sites/default/files/nokia_people_and_planet_report_2017.pdf (March 1, 2019).
2
Interview with Ron Haberman, March 15, 2018. Subsequent quotations are from the authors’ interviews unless
otherwise noted.
Sheila Melvin and Professor Yossi Feinberg prepared this case as the basis for class discussion rather than to
illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of an administrative situation.

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Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 2

But, whatever the ultimate results of I@NS, Haberman expected its very existence to have a
positive impact on Nokia Software.

BACKGROUND

The decision to start I@NS came about serendipitously, sparked by what Haberman called a
“mistake.” Haberman was already a seasoned entrepreneur when he joined Nokia Software in
2015 to head up its CloudBand product and streamline the unit’s organizational structure. Even
after the successful restructuring, however, Haberman found himself left with “all these things
that did not fit in the other buckets,” namely the Internet of Things, Analytics, Cloud, Self-
Organizing Networks, and Security.

When Haberman mentioned this issue to his boss Bhaskar Gorti, president of Nokia Software, he
got an unexpected response. Gorti, he recalled, said, “Ron, you know what? You take all these
small guys. You nurture them, make sure that they get what they need, go beyond the hype, start
making some money. And when they get to a certain size, your job is to graduate them out.”
Nokia Software would create a new division called Emerging Products to house these units prior
to their “graduation” to standalone status. Haberman listened to Gorti and then observed that if
he graduated just one of the five product units, that would be a 20 percent success rate, which
would already be quite high by industry standards. And Gorti responded, “No, you need to get
all five.”

“Terrific,” Haberman thought. “He wants a 100 percent success rate.” And then he sat down
with the strategy team and thought about how best to operate Emerging Products. To establish
criteria for success, they looked at the life-cycle of a start-up. If a start-up was on the right
trajectory, said Haberman, it would have extremely high growth—by factors of hundreds, or
even thousands—and then slowly stabilize until it reached still very strong, possibly double-digit
growth. “And, from my perspective, that was the main criteria for graduation,” he explained.
Once a unit had reached optimum good growth, they would look at the numbers. “So, if you go
down to 10 percent growth and you’re stuck still at only $10 million a year, then the destination
is probably the garbage can,” he said. “But, if you get to the 10 percent when you’re at $100
million a year, then it’s probably a standalone unit.”

In 2017, Analytics graduated into a standalone unit called Connected Intelligence, leaving
Emerging Products with just four units remaining. This led to an existential question: was the
purpose of Emerging Products to graduate itself out of existence, or to create a pipeline for new
ideas?

The answer, Haberman and his colleagues decided, was to create a pipeline and for that they
would need what they called an “explore” option that would facilitate the active pursuit of new
ideas that could then be incubated and possibly graduated. They debated whether it would be
best to limit this exploration to people who already worked in Emerging Products or to broaden it
out to all of Nokia Software; ultimately, they decided on the wider net. “Because it would be a
big loss for all of us if we only utilized the brainpower of the people that are just by chance in
Emerging Products,” said Haberman. “And that’s how I@NS was born.”
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 3

BUILDING I@NS

Having decided to create a new program, Haberman and his colleagues moved quickly to
structure and implement it.

Structure

I@NS was structured in four phases: explore, hack, validate, and incubate. (See Exhibits 1 to 3.)
The program placed no limit on the number of ideas that any one person or team could submit—
providing, that is, they were committed to following through with the hack phase in the event
their idea was selected. Likewise, there were no limitations on the scope of the ideas that could
be submitted, although entrants were advised in the I@NS FAQ:

It’s common best practice to build on the strengths we have within the company.
As such we are looking for 1) extending our existing products and technologies in
new markets or with new business models, and 2) introducing new products and
technologies with our established customer base.

During the explore phase, which had no mandated time limit, interested Nokia Software
employees were encouraged to toss around ideas and consider whether or not they were
worthwhile to pursue; some formed teams to do this, while others pondered alone. These ideas
were then to be reviewed by juries comprised of senior architects, engineers, sales managers, and
other executives. The jury then assigned scores, and ideas deemed interesting or viable enough
would pass the “Start Gate” and proceed to the hack phase.

During the hack phase, which was intended to last 9 to 12 weeks, I@NS expected participants to
explore their ideas more deeply, move towards a specific example solution, and make a
justifiable case for Nokia Software to invest in it. Haberman hoped the process would include
extensive conversations with customers so as to understand their needs. The more concrete the
solution, the higher the likelihood it would move forward. The company allowed participants
who made it to this phase to devote 20 percent of their worktime to hacking their project.

Those participants who passed the hack phase moved on to the “Seed Gate,” or validation phase.
This was a six- to nine-month period designed to enable them to determine the viability and
scalability of the product. During the validation period, Nokia Software permitted I@NS
participants to work full time and allocated a budget for developing their idea, even as they
received their regular salary and benefits. There was, however, no guarantee that their job would
be waiting for them at the end of the validation phase; individual managers could decide on their
own whether or not to backfill the position of an I@NS participant.

At the end of the validation phase, the jury would choose participants whose projects showed the
most promise for Nokia Software to continue to the incubation, or build and grow, period. This
would entail working full time to build the product (or solution) and determine its financial
viability and scalability. Nokia could not guarantee a job for any employee whose idea
ultimately failed at the end of this phase—the company saw risk as an essential element of
innovation. And Nokia did not spell out the potential financial upside, but assured participants
“you will be recognized and financially rewarded if we succeed together.” The incentive plan
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 4

was success oriented, Haberman explained. “They get the significant incentive package
immediately, but it vests. Like a start-up. So, when the idea is worth something, they get paid
based on their virtual options.”

Leadership

Volunteers from across Nokia Software comprised the leadership of I@NS. It was, in
Haberman’s words, an “eclectic” group.

The core team included six people with the expertise to contribute in a needed area and the
willingness to do so in addition to their full-time jobs. Noy Itzikowitz, a sociable entrepreneur
with considerable start-up experience who served as Nokia Software’s director of R&D, was
tasked with getting the program up and running. Chris Deloddere, of Emerging Product
Strategy, took charge of all things process related—dealing with HR, legal, definitions of
success. Iris Finkelstein-Sagi, a marketing executive, worked on all-important communications.
Ken Georgiades had done project management with Haberman in the past and volunteered to
oversee all the touchpoints of the program and make sure they were fully in sync with Nokia’s
processes and procedures. Judy Foster, an HR director, helped with HR-related aspects, which
proved unexpectedly complex.

The core team had many questions about the program—most of which as yet had no answers—
so Haberman tasked them with creating a list of frequently asked questions, and the answers to
accompany them (see Exhibit 4). Once the program started to run, requests of every kind came
in for computers, cloud space, and the like. These were directed to core team members who
would somehow find a way to provide what was needed. “It was a lot of work and a lot of time,”
said Haberman, “but there’s so much learning and so much excitement that they were probably
more excited about this than their day job.”

Spreading the Word

Having crafted a structure and drafted a core leadership team, the next step was to spread word
of the program. The I@NS leadership determined fairly early on that Nokia’s go-to method of
sending out a big announcement would not suffice because this approach had rarely worked in
the past. “Beyond the first hoopla, people don’t just get energized because of the announcement
and start doing things,” Haberman explained. “There needs to be quite a close connection with
somebody in the program.” They therefore decided to adopt a less top-down and more “for the
people, by the people” grassroots approach. During a meeting to discuss launching the program,
Josh Aroner, VP of marketing for Nokia Software, suggested creating a group of people who
would spread the word—an “evangelists group.” Explained Haberman:

We said, you know what? We will go and find individuals who are already
known to be high-potential, and we will identify people from every area of the
business and every locality where we’re in. And we’re gonna bring them into the
program and we’re gonna call this group the evangelist ring. And the evangelist
ring will be responsible for spreading the word locally.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 5

Finding such individuals could be a challenge in a big company, noted Haberman, “because
nobody likes to volunteer their best people to do something else.” He therefore opted for the
“loaded ask” by requesting help from his colleagues in the presence of Gorti, the Nokia Software
president, and the entire senior leadership team. The tactic worked—he got two or three names
from each manager and soon built up a roster of about 50 evangelists located throughout Nokia
Software. Haberman’s hope was that these people would not only put up posters and send out
announcements about the program, but also make themselves available to answer questions,
recruit people to the program, and generally evangelize its merits. In the end, the evangelists did
all this and more, becoming the program’s jurors, support network, and facilitators. Explained
Haberman:

They were there to connect all the participants to other participants they needed,
but did not know. Imagine that you’re in product A here, in San Jose. And you
think of an idea that has an attachment to product B. And product B is being
developed in Poland. Your chances of finding a path to a group of individuals
that can help you is zero. But if you have an evangelist on site and that individual
knows all the other evangelists and what they can help with, all of a sudden, your
problem is exactly one hop away. So, you go to one person and they figure it out
in the bigger team.

Accepting and Judging Entries

All entries to I@NS were submitted online; this required completing a two-page template and
entering the idea in a tool. An entrant who had questions or needed assistance could contact an
evangelist or just explain in the form what was needed and an evangelist would respond.

I@NS then assembled juries of three to five people to consider the entries, with careful
consideration given to the jurors’ locality, background, and product grouping—and thus their
ability to objectively evaluate the idea. To ensure balance, some jurors from outside Nokia were
also included. Jurors were asked to consider each idea’s potential for disruption and value
proposition; the real pain point that the solution was trying to “cure” for clients and users; and
how realistic and well-researched the idea was. An internal “Gates Panel” was then convened to
review the ideas with the highest scores and determine which would pass through the Start Gate
and the Seed Gate.

As entries started to roll in, Haberman and his colleagues began to discuss whether they needed a
more specific definition of a “good idea.” He elaborated:

Maybe that sounds really silly, but what is the criteria of a good idea? What is a
good idea? We had endless debates on this question. Because, on the one hand,
people wanted to actually have a lot of criteria, define size of the market, define it
based on complexity of technology, define it based on areas of interest of the
business. And on this particular one, I was the one on the complete extreme side,
and I said everything is a good idea. I don’t know yet. Who am I, beforehand, to
say what’s gonna be a good idea or not? I thought that sharing videos of cats on
the Internet was a really stupid idea, but obviously there’s quite a bit of money in
there. So, what do we know?
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 6

In the end, they compromised, and made one rule: no employee could use I@NS to bypass his or
her own product management. In other words, if a product management team had set a lower
priority to something the employee wanted to do, he or she could not then take the idea to I@NS
in an effort to skirt the product management team. “We’re not going to develop things that are
basically enhancements of the existing products,” Haberman said. “Anything else goes, okay?
Just submit it. And through the process, we will give you guidance as to whether it fits, doesn’t
fit, how to enhance, what to add or subtract to make it better for what we’re looking for.” And,
since every rule has an exception, they made one of those, too, added Haberman. “If you think
that what we’re doing right now is old-fashioned and you have a way better tech to do this,
cheaper, bigger, faster, whatever it might be, then it’s fine.”

Having decided, effectively, that there was no such thing as a bad idea, I@NS then had to take
every idea seriously—even the bad ones. Therefore, no ideas were dismissed outright; every
idea went through the entire jury process and received a ranking. At the close of the submission
deadline on August 31, 2017, there were 180 entries from 24 countries—significantly more than
Haberman had imagined, especially given his planned success rate of no more than 5 percent.
Jurors culled through the submissions with each individual juror reviewing the proposal and
completing a scorecard. The I@NS support team then created an ordered list of the top 40 ideas
based on jury scoring and the Gates Panel selected 18 proposals to pass the Start Gate and enter
the hack phase. The chosen teams then had nine to twelve weeks to solidify their idea, come up
with a list of customers, talk to some people, and build a prototype, if warranted and possible. At
the end of the Explore phase, a Decision Committee (aka the Gates Panel) of three people—
Haberman, CTO McCann, and Hans Geerde, head of strategy and business development—
selected those who would pass through the gates to the next phase.

Haberman sat on the Decision Committee and provided insight to the process:

It was all backed with very good reasoning. But most of it is gut feel. Very little
of it is science. Somebody says, “Well, I think this is gonna be more or less
successful, more or less capable or possible, more or less differentiated.” It’s not
like you can actually back it up on the spot with figures, especially given most of
these ideas are outside all of our comfort zone. Because, by definition, they’re
supposed to be something new.

The I@NS entry systems were left open so anybody could see how each proposal was scored. In
the end, however, Nokia Software President Bhaskar Gorti had to approve the proposals. “All
the money and people are internal,” said Haberman. “We invite external guests to hear the pitch
and recommend their views, but at the end of the day, it’s my boss’s pocket. He needs to say yes
or no.”

Nokia Culture for Product Development

The challenge of expectations that came with being part of Nokia, an august corporation with a
perfectionist creed, weighed heavily on I@NS, said Haberman. “Under the brand Nokia, the
expression ‘we will do our best’ doesn’t fly.” Unlike a start-up that focuses on execution before
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 7

perfection, at Nokia people were used to making tight predictions and delivering accordingly.
This was also evident in the expectations of Nokia’s clients. Haberman’s take on this was:

If you’re a ten-person start-up and you work with a large service provider, for
example, you tell them, “This is who we are. This is what we got. You want it in
April? Maybe. We’ll try to hit mid-April. I can’t guarantee it.” At Nokia, they
have a project that is due next April, they want an exact hour for delivery. “You
shall deliver all these things at this date.” And even when you’re small within
Nokia, they don’t care. So doing real start-up growth outside, with all the extra
pressure and uncertainty of funding, is actually easier than inside.

Another aspect of Nokia culture that complicated the I@NS effort was the belief that every
product must leave the factory only when largely perfected and completely bug-free. Haberman
wanted I@NS participants to talk to potential customers and get their feedback in order to
validate their ideas. But it was very hard for participants to approach a customer without a
finished product in hand—not to mention, go to a customer and draw a picture on the board or
build the concept out of Lego, as Haberman urged them to do. “They thought I’m crazy,” he
explained. “I mean, ‘How can I have a serious conversation with a customer if I have nothing?’
And we went through a few examples of start-ups that did it this way and then people get more
convinced. But it’s very difficult. It’s not very intuitive to have the nerve to take this approach.
The more comfortable discussion is when you feel that you already invested a lot and you come
to the customer ready.”

Springing from the same well was the resistance to I@NS exhibited by the sales department.
“Nokia Sales didn’t want to have anything to do with it,” said Haberman, explaining that their
primary concern—understandably—was to retire the quarter at hand, not try new things. Equally
important, they had no desire to endanger their customer relationships by introducing the risk of
a proposed product from I@NS. “Because if you go and talk to a customer and then I cancel this
project because it didn’t hit a certain milestone, they lose face.”

And, an ever-present sword of Damocles—specific not to Nokia, but to any big corporation—
was the threat of budget cuts. “You’re always a target during budget discussion times,” said
Haberman. “Always. Because there is nothing that big corporations like to kill first more than
the new stuff. And the argument of, ‘Well, if you kill this research, there is no pipeline for the
future,’ only takes you as far as the cut is. If you cannot survive, obviously you cannot invest.
And telecom right now is under a lot of pressure as an industry… so budget is always a big
concern.”

Communicating Failure

The first incarnation of I@NS was off to a great start with over 180 entries from 24 countries,
and 18 of those were selected in the Start Gate. The first crucial question for the I@NS core
team was how to communicate failure. Most of the people who entered I@NS would fail to
move onward and, in fact, only 18 of 180 entries made it past the Start Gate, but I@NS did not
want to discourage those who had failed from trying again in the next round. “So now,”
Haberman explained, “we need to take these people who for years have been working in an
environment where failure was a very negative thing and figure out: how do we start changing
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 8

the perception and encourage people to embrace it? And how do we do this through our
communications?” The key, he said, was to appropriately set and communicate expectations by,
for example, providing the odds of moving forward through the various gates and offering
examples of start-ups that failed, even as others in the same market succeeded.

One way in which the I@NS core team worked to mitigate the disappointment of not being
selected to move forward was by asking for advice on improving the program. “We asked them
to tell us what they thought we should do differently,” explained Haberman. “And it was kind of
surprising that most of them found it strange that we were asking for feedback. Each time I had
to explain, “Look, it’s not like I think that we have it down. We want you to apply next time, so
tell us how we can make your life better. Is there something that you need? Do we need to think
about it differently?"

Another was by offering the opportunity for revision and re-submission, with a shortcut to the
next round. As Haberman explained, the jury might say, “Look, we liked the concept. We liked
the team. We think that there’s something there. There are one or two areas that we didn’t buy
in your story. If you feel you can fix them, we will actually shortcut you to the next round.”

One team, for example, submitted an idea for smart farming that used imagery to understand the
health of crops and then combined this with soil and location data to determine whether that was
the best crop for the region. They developed the concept and even had a prototype, but when
they made their pitch, they suggested using the technology to go after the home gardening
market. This had two problems, in Haberman’s view. For one, Nokia did not sell to the home
market—it was a B2B business. So, while aiming for an individual consumer was not
impossible, it was highly unlikely. The second, and more important, problem was juror doubts
that a home gardener would be willing to set up a video and soil data collection system just to
decide if tomatoes or cucumbers were better for the soil in his or her garden. The feedback was
thus simple, explained Haberman: “We like it. It sounds like a reasonable thing. But you need
to go to professional farming, get some reaction and some competitive information, and figure
out whether there is something for us to do there; if you feel that there is, come back.”

FORGING AHEAD

More than a year into the program, I@NS was still a work in progress, but its impact was already
being felt. Explained Haberman:

Culture change was the number one criteria of success: get people to accept
failure, do more collaborative work across businesses, approach customers early,
do design thinking with customers, create transparency, create cross-area
solutions. Not to mention maybe the number one thing: put the customer at the
center. So don’t focus on the product you’re building, focus on the user of this
product.

It is all of these things that are more critical than any amount of money that any
one of these ideas will get us in the next few years.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 9

Exhibit 1
What is Nokia I@NSW Program?

Source: Nokia.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 10

Exhibit 2
Start-up Cycle

Source: Nokia.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 11

Exhibit 3
Where are we today?

Source: Nokia.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 12

Exhibit 4
I@NS FAQ

The program

Q: Why is this program different from any other innovation program in Nokia?
A: First, this is not only about innovation and this is a Nokia Software-driven program. The long-
term intention is to create a “business system” to enable Nokia internal technopreneurs to realize
ideas into commercially successful products. The “system” would lower systemic barriers for
technopreneurs through maintaining their current salary and benefit structures, while providing
them with tools, platforms and functional support. The intent of “I@NS” is to uncover, nurture
and retain creative and entrepreneurial talent in the organization with the goal of introducing new
products and entering new markets. The program participants will be rewarded by the
opportunity for personal growth, new career paths, and the possibility to build and work with
their own chosen team on exciting topics, with a to-be-developed incentive model for
commercially successful projects (see below the FAQ on the upside for participants).

Q: What is the connection with other innovation programs?

A: At present, there is no direct relation to other innovation programs in Nokia. Nevertheless, we
are in touch with people driving innovation in other units, and have an agreement that if
proposals arise which might fit better in another Business Group, we will get the right
organizations involved.

Q: What is the expected outcome of this initiative?

A: The definition of success is that we get ideas, which were initiated by our colleagues, through
what in Venture Capital terminology is the Series A funding gate. In short, this means that the
Validation phase after Seed funding brought positive business results, and we decide to go into a
Build / Grow phase for optimizing the product, and scaling it out across different markets to
generate new long-term profit for Nokia Software.

Q: What is the Executive ‘real time and money investment’?

A: The I@AA program is supported by the Nokia Software Senior Leadership Team, and a
budget for projects which pass the Seed Gate is set aside to support teams with critical
infrastructure, SW licenses, IaaS purchases, etc. From the Seed Gate, selected teams will be
allowed to work full time on their projects for the duration of the Validate phase, which can be
up to nine months.

Practical participation

Q: Who can submit an idea?

A: Since we are in an early phase, the I@NS program is currently limited to Nokia Software
employees only. We are investigating cooperation with other Nokia Business Groups and may
extend the participation in the future.
Q: Should I ask permission of my boss to participate?
A: This program is supported by the Nokia Software Senior Leadership Team, and we expect in
most cases that there will be no permission issue, but as each work situation is different, you will
need to coordinate your time spend on the I@NS initiative with your direct manager.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 13

Q: How can people move from their current job to this kind of project?
A: The main requirement is to have a good idea that will make it through the Start Gate. From
there, you will be supported to execute the Hack phase, and if successful, you have a chance that
the project gets funding as internal start-up for the Validation phase. The exact timing and
availability will need to be discussed with your direct manager.

Q: What if I have an idea but I don’t have a team?

A: It is not necessary to have a team, you can individually submit your idea and program
participation. However, if you do think there is a need to involve other people e.g. due to
required special skills or expertize, our advice is to look in your own network first. Alternatively,
describe the team needs in your submission form and leave the names of the team members
open. At acceptance of the idea, one of the I@NS evangelists or facilitators will get in touch to
help you with suggestions.

Q: Is there a min/max size of a team?

A: The minimum is one, and while we do not want to impose a maximum, we expect teams
generally to not go over five people. We do request you to consider only adding people to the
team who are absolutely needed because of their specific skills or expertize. You should think of
this as starting your own business, and be very selective in people who you want to work with in
the same way. From the Seed Gate, a fixed budget will be allocated, and we expect you to
allocate this wisely between internal contributors and external resources.

Q: What is mandatory input for an idea to be considered?

Please have a look at the Start Gate template we provided. It contains a number of questions to
be answered, such as what, why, how, who, and associated guidelines. Also think of a project
visualization and detail as far as you know your initial budget estimate for the next (Seed) phase.

Q: How many ideas can I submit?

A: There is no limitation in number ideas you can submit. Do keep in mind though that the main
driver for the I@AA initiative is "Intrapreneurship", and we do expect people who submitted the
selected ideas to commit on the execution of the next step (Hack implementation phase).

Q: What is the definition of a hack, do you have any examples, what is good (enough)?
A: The intention of the Hack phase is to in a short time (maximum two months) detail your idea
towards a specific example solution. This may be an initial concrete implementation in SW
and/or a worked-out business plan with more justification of the value of the idea. The more
concrete, the higher your chance of passing through the Seed gate.

Q: What if I have an idea, but cannot execute on the hack?

A: You can submit your idea and candidacy alone and list the required special skills or expertize.
It is better though to look in your own network first if there are people who could help you with
the hack. Alternatively, at acceptance of the idea, one of the I@NS evangelists or facilitators will
get in touch to help you with suggestions.

Q: How can I manage my time with the idea and my current work?
A: During the Explore stage, you are allowed to spend a limited amount of time to describe and
work-out your idea, and we expect this to be no more than a few hours. From the Start Gate, the
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 14

time allowance is up to 20% of your regular work time, and after passing the Seed Gate, and to
go into the Validation phase, the intention is to use job rotation for the duration needed, and as
such you will work on the idea for 100%. Ensure to agree with your manager on the appropriate
moment and time to work on this project, to minimize impact on other tasks.

Q: Can I work with external people (contractors, university, school, partner, supplier), and what
is the budget?
A: In the Hack phase, you are expected to work only with people internal to Nokia. However,
don’t hesitate to add in the description your suggestions for a potential cooperation, which may
be granted if the idea moves through the Seed gate. In this case, the I@NS facilitator team will
help you with setting-up the right legal and practical environment to support you.

Q: Who is the customer in the Validation phase and what is the engagement model?
A: It is indeed strongly advised to work with a lead customer in the Validation phase, but other
than a fit with Nokia Software business objectives, the program is not restricted to specific
customers. The (lead) customer should be selected based on the intended project result, as
indicated in the Start Gate template, and can be internal to Nokia, within our Telco or GEPS
customer base or even prospective customers. If you did not propose a specific customer at the
Start or Seed Gate, you should work with your team, network, coach, and/or the I@NS facilitator
team to identify and set-up contact. Our Legal Counsel can support you on what you can share,
and assist in ensuring the right Non-Disclosure Agreement is set-up.

Scope

Q: Is there any limitation on the idea scope?

A: One of the main objectives of the I@AA initiative is to nurture ideas which have potential for
Nokia Software, and can extend our business into new areas. As SW business group of Nokia,
we are focusing mostly on SW products and associated creative business models. Furthermore,
we are looking for implementations which match our corporate capabilities. This focus should
not hold you back from submitting very ambitious proposals, as if the idea is considered worthy
of cross BU consideration, we may team up with other business groups and/or partner companies
in the execution.

Q: Can you be more specific of any technologies and markets that we want to go after?
A: It’s common best practice to build on the strengths we have within the company. As such we
are looking for 1) extending our existing products and technologies in new markets or with new
business models, and 2) introducing new products and technologies with our established
customer base. As reference, you can find details on our current portfolio on Nokia Central,
though don’t hesitate to submit an out-of-the-box idea, you never know if it may become the
next ‘gem’ product.

Q: Is there any guideline for, or restriction in SW code we can use?

A: While our general principle is to have the minimal possible number of restrictions, and allow
you to build from open source and pre-existing code, we have one main request: please
familiarize yourself with what is available from the Common Software Foundations (CSF) work.
This initiative is bringing Nokia Software applications together into a coherent suite, and all new
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 15

product implementations must use the available code wherever possible. Therefore, it is also
strongly advised to even from the Hack phase start from the CSF.

Support

Q: Can I have a mentor/coach to help me with the business aspects?

A: Yes, the I@AA facilitator team will for the selected ideas evaluate your needs and connect
you with an appropriate coach.

Q: What can or should evangelists offer to idea submitters, are they coaches?
A: Evangelists are chosen on basis of their interest and openness to support an innovation
culture, and their main responsibility in I@AA is to reach out to Nokia Software employee
communities around the world to make them aware of this initiative. We understand that these
people are in high demand and therefore do not expect them to combine this with a coaching
function. That said, we also welcome evangelists’ participation in the program both as idea
submitter or coach.

Q: Can I order a market study report on my subject to learn more about the competition field?
A: Nokia has subscriptions to many market study reports from several analysts. We advise to
first do a search on the Infoview website, and if you do not find what you need, and/or know of a
better report, you can issue a request for research assistance.

Q: Is Nokia going to invest in patent registration for my idea?

A: Not all “ideas” are patentable, so that would be determined as part of the normal Nokia patent
registration process.

Q: Can you give me confidence that when I pass the gates, my budget will not be cut after?
A: The intention of the program is to follow a milestone based investment scheme (like for a
start-up), and there is a dedicated OPEX budget set aside. At each Gate, a decision will be made
on the budget available for the next phase.

Q: How can I find people with certain expertise or interest to cooperate with?
A: The Delve tool used in Nokia has the capability to add your expertise and interests. As it is
relatively new, it may take some time to become widely used, and meanwhile we suggest you
post your question in our Yammer group, or do a search.

Benefits for participants

Q: Why would I not keep the idea for myself and start an own business?
A: If you are thinking about this, you’re certainly one of the people we want to participate!
While we all hear about the great start-up success stories, reality is that most really fail. Starting
up a business requires a lot of various skills, connections, support, and funding—and access to
all of these things is not a trivial endeavor. The I@NS initiative allows participants to start small
and get all the support needed to make a project a success, such as legal, procurement,
marketing, global sales for access to customers, etc. Not in the least, the Nokia brand is an
extremely strong differentiating asset. And in case it does fail, you have the Nokia safety net to
return to, and will have learned a lot of valuable skills for your future career.
Intrapreneurship @ Nokia Software: Instilling Culture Change SM-320(A) p. 16

Q: How do you reward risk?

A: We are aware that risk taking does not come natural in a Telecom environment, and that it is
nevertheless extremely important for innovation. Therefore, we reward smart risk taking by
acting open minded towards accepting, supporting and funding unorthodox ideas which
challenge business as usual. On top, we remove the negative impact you would have in a start-up
in case the idea is unsuccessful at any stage, and will work with your line managers to provide a
fall back to your former position where possible, or will help you to identify a new role. Finally,
by participating in this initiative you will acquire new expertize and skills, which will open the
door to new career opportunities.

Q: Would I have an upside beyond my regular income?

A: There is a plan to create, within the I@NS program, a compensation scheme that better
reflects the risk and rewards of an entrepreneur. We are discussing a number of proposals with
HR and Finance, and have worked-out references from our Comptel team. However, given the
legal issues to provide fair and equal opportunities for employees in more than 150 countries, we
need more time to finalize this. In summary—you will be recognized and financially rewarded if
we succeed together.

Q: How can I ensure nobody else will steal my idea?

A: Creativity and innovation is most effective in environments where people can openly share
and discuss ideas. Therefore, we created the submission tool in such way that all ideas are visible
to others within Nokia. When you submit your idea in the I@NS tool, it will get a time stamp so
that everyone can see who came up with the original idea first. As for all the work you do under
contract with the company, the ideas generated during the I@NS program remain property of
Nokia. (see also the above FAQ on the upside for participants).

Q: If my idea does not pass one of the gates, can I create my own startup outside of Nokia to
realize it?
A: All Intellectual Property generated as part of this program remains the ownership of Nokia
and cannot be used outside of the company.

For managers

Q: I’m a manager of an employee who has an idea in the Hack phase. What is expected of me?
A: We recognize that your team(s) have commitments and that managing those can be more
challenging when an employee is involved with I@NS. We thank you in advance for your
commitment to ensuring Nokia Software as a world class, innovative software organization. Here
are a few simple things you can do to help: tell your employee they have your support in helping
them be successful, work a plan to provide up to 20% “hack” time including dedicated blocks of
uninterrupted time, and above all else be encouraging and enthusiastic about their opportunity.