PRESS RELEASE 	September 11th, 2009, at 11.00 a.m.



Nokia Technopolis Innovation Mill Breeds 4 New Start-ups





Technopolis announced that 4 new companies have been created 

through the Nokia Technopolis Innovation Mill IPR spinout 

platform.  Two companies are public – There Corporation and 

Sports Tracking Technologies Ltd – while 2 others remain in 

stealth mode.  In addition  There Corporation announced a 

major venture capital round.



Nokia Corporation, Technopolis PLC and the Finnish Funding 

Agency for Technology and Innovation (TEKES) announced the Nokia 

Technopolis Innovation program in May, 2009.  The purpose of the 

3-year program is to convert Nokia’s unused ideas and 

innovations into growth businesses through both founding new 

companies and by licensing them to selected Finnish ICT 

companies for further development and exploitation.



The first set of innovations were approved last month, and while 

two of them remain in stealth mode, both There Corporation and 

Sports Tracking Technologies are making a very significant impact.



There Corporation was formed in May 2009 by the management team 

of the Nokia Smart Home program to commercialize technology 

developed over a number of years at Nokia. All the related 

development, results, materials, deals and know-how have been 

transferred from Nokia to There Corporation with a licensing 

deal between the companies. At the same time, the Comsel team 

was merged with the company, bringing smart metering and energy 

efficiency know-how to the There Corporation. The first pilot 

solutions are expected to be released in the beginning of 2010.



There Corporation also announced today that it has closed a €4,5 

million funding round. The main investors are the current 

management team and Power Fund II which is managed by the 

Finnish venture capitalist VNT Management specializing in green, 

clean technologies.



Sports Tracking Technologies is developing applications based on 

the extremely popular Nokia Sports Tracker application, which 

millions of mobile phone users have downloaded worldwide. The 

company plans to roll out a number of new applications and tools 

in the coming months, including extending their client offering 

to cover new platforms in addition to Nokia's Series 60.



Under the Innovation Mill program, both companies received grant 

packages to help them complete product development and market 

research.  In There Corporation’s case, the grants were received 

from the City of Tampere and TEKES, while the city of Helsinki 

along with TEKES contributed to Sports Tracking Technologies.



The founders of each company say that Innovation Mill catalyzed 

their spin-outs from Nokia.  Jussi Kaasinen, one of the founders 

of Sports Tracking Technologies stated 'the Technopolis team 

helped us raise the initial grants by Tekes and City of 

Helsinki, and are now actively helping us find the expertise to 

build the company”.Toni Sormunen, founder and COO of There 

Corporation, agrees, “the Innovation Mill program helped us 

focus on business while giving us additional capital to speed 

product development and to do proper market research.”



“We are very happy with the progress of Innovation Mill,” stated 

Will Cardwell, Director of Technopolis Development Services. “We 

are at the rate of an average of one spinout per month, and we 

have a nice pipeline of new deals in the works.  These new 

companies prove that Innovation Mill is a viable model, and we 

hope that more and more existing companies will also leverage 

Nokia’s non-core IPR through our Innovation Mill program. 



About Technopolis

Measured by the number of clients, Technopolis Plc is one of 

Europe's largest science and technology park chains. The 

Technopolis Group is Finland's largest specialized provider of 

business environment services for high tech companies offering a 

comprehensive range of services combining modern premises with 

business and development services. Technopolis operates 

technology centers in Espoo, Helsinki, Jyväskylä, Lappeenranta, 

Oulu, Tampere and Vantaa in Finland, and in St. Petersburg in 

Russia. Currently, some 1,180 companies with 16,000 employees 

are working in the Technopolis technology centers. 

www.technopolis.fi



About There Corporation

There corporation was established in May 2009 by the Nokia Smart 

Home team with the know-how of mobile and platform technology.  

Combining this with the smart metering experience of the Comsel 

team from the Vaasa energy cluster creates a unique and strong 

basis to for developing new generation energy solutions. 

www.therecorporation.com



About Sports Tracking Technologies

Sports Tracking Technologies corporation was established in May 

2009 by the Nokia Sports Tracker team management, with years of 

experience in building the Nokia Sports Tracker mobile 

application and web site. The company develops a multi-platform 

sports tracking experience inspiring and activating people 

globally. info@sportstrackingtechnologies.com