HELSINKI, March 14 (Xinhua) -- Nokia Siemens Networks, the joint venture of Finnish handset maker Nokia and German conglomerate Siemens, will start operations on April 1, Nokia announced in Espoo, Finland on Wednesday.

    Nokia and Siemens are contributing their respective carrier networks businesses and corresponding assets into this 50-50 joint venture. Both parties have agreed to increase their respective net asset contributions to the new company, with Siemens to contribute2.4 billion euros (over 3.1 billion U.S. dollars) and Nokia to contribute 1.7 billion euros.

    With its global scale and size, Nokia Siemens Networks is in a great position to play an industry leading role by developing innovative, cost-efficient products and services. Nokia Siemens Networks will have one of the world's best research and development teams, who will advance the development of product platforms and services for next-generation fixed and mobile networks.

    As communicated previously, the board of Nokia Siemens Network swill consist of seven members. Nokia President and CEO, Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, will chair the board and Siemens CEO, Klaus Kleinfeld, will act as the vice-chair.

    Nokia Siemens Networks which will be the world's second-biggest mobile-networks company and the third-largest in fixed-line infrastructure had been due to begin at the start of 2007 but was delayed by a corruption investigation at Siemens.