Huawei invades Nokia's turf, plans on opening R&D center in Finland

Huawei is building an R&D center in Finland

Chinese handset manufacturer Huawei says that it is spending the equivalent of $90 million to open an R&D center in Helsinki, Finland. That would mean that the upstart smartphone producer would be invading Nokia's home turf as it plans on doubling its workforce in Europe over the next three to five years. Huawei will spend the money budgeted for the project over the next five years and plans on employing 100 people in the center to write software for Android and Windows Phone devices.

This will be Huawei's first office in the country, but its 11th in Europe. The company currently has 7,000 workers in Europe, a number likely to hit 14,000 by 2017. Back in September, the company announced a $2 billion commitment to the U.K. with another R&D center scheduled to open in Spain.

The new Finnish R&D center for Huawei will be minutes away from Nokia's HQ in Espoo. The beleaguered Finnish handset company recently entered into a sale and lease back agreement for the building.