As one of its lesser-heralded announcements at Mobile World Congress this week, Nokia said it would retire the Withings wearables brand this summer, relaunching the products under the Nokia name.
Withings has been one of the longer-lasting brands in the wearables and consumer digital health fields. It was bought by Nokia in April of last year for € 175 million.
Nokia, once the worldwide leader in cell phones, itself has had no lack of drama. Having largely missed the transition to smartphones, its mobile phone operations were bought by Microsoft, and we all know how that turned out.
Nokia has reinvented itself as a communications infrastructure company and expects to use the Withings portfolio as the cornerstone of a digital health business.