Mr. Jorma Ollila, Chairman of the Board of Directors of both Nokia Corporation and Royal Dutch Shell Plc, discussed both the history of the NOKIA brand, as well as, the country brand project, in which he is involved, at the StratMark 09 -seminar held in Helsinki yesterday.

Trade marks were briefly mentioned as tools in the brand building process, but the real focus was on the underlying values of a brand, which according to Mr. Ollila should be at the root of any branding process.

An interesting point, and as we are all pleased to notice, these values also make it to the pages of our work. For example, product quality and image considerations are of great relevance to argumentation based on Article 8(5) CTMR (trade marks with reputation), thus linking the underlying values also to our daily practice of trade mark law.