Nokia Loses a Key Executive from Enpocket

Mike Baker came to Enpocket to build up the company and stayed on for a year after the Nokia acquisition.

“I’m an entrepreneur and I love building companies from scratch,” said Baker, VP and head of Nokia Interactive Advertising. August 8 is his final day with the global handset manufacturer that has mobile media designs.

Baker joined mobile advertising firm Enpocket in July 2004 and while his passion lies with building smaller companies, he headed up Nokia’s fledgling ad network for close to a year since the acquisition of Enpocket.

During the past year, he worked to expand the Nokia Media Network. The latest expansion, which happened in February, expanded the network’s reach from parts of Europe and Asia to a more global audience extending to the the U.S., South America, and more of Europe. It also brought in marquee publishers such as Hearst, Reuters, Discovery, and AccuWeather.

Time spent with Nokia this past year was valuable to Nokia, but also valuable to Baker. “It’s been a year with Nokia, and Nokia is a truly global company in a way that few businesses are, and that’s been a true learning experience for me,” Baker said.

Transition to a new head of Nokia Interactive Advertising is expected to be smooth. Longtime executive with the company Tom Henricksson is already named to step into the role. “Tom was the integration manager for the acquisition, and is very familiar with the business,” said Baker. “He moved to join the management team in Boston over the last year. It will be a very actual and easy progression.”

Baker feels it’s a good time for Henricksson to take over the business. “From Nokia’s perspective, Tom’s a great guy to head the business at this stage. The objectives are no longer to prove out of market, but now scale of business, achieve operational excellence, and systems required for a more mature market,” Baker said.

What’s in store after Nokia? Baker isn’t getting into specifics just yet. “There’s so much going on in the digital advertising space, and it’s a great time to be doing that,” he said.

“I’ve long been a personal investor in companies in the space. I’m going to do a little bit of consulting, and do some investing. That will keep me busy for a bit anyhow,” Baker told ClickZ.