The former world number one mobile maker, Nokia is returning to the mobile phone market in 2016

The chief executive of the company told Germany’s Manager Magazin that the company is again planning to start designing and licensing mobile phones once an agreement with partner Microsoft allows it to in 2016.

“We will look for suitable partners,” Rajeev Suri said in an interview published on Thursday. “Microsoft makes mobile phones. We would simply design them and then make the brand name available to license.

The Finland Company has sold its phone business to Microsoft in 2014 when their sales decline as it failed to keep up with innovations led by Apple’s iPhone.

Nokia could still back off from its hopes and dreams, but it seems that Nokia’s phones will rise from the ashes in 2016. As mentioned above, this time the company would not try to rebuild the devices. On the other hand, a third-party manufacturers would pay for the rights to make Nokia-designed phones and sell them under the name of Nokia.

In April, Nokia announced a $17.8 billion takeover of Alcatel-Lucent to increase the network equipment business that is its mainstay now. The company is presently looking to sell its mapping platform, known as HERE.

‘HERE’ is a solid map platform that would be a key piece of any smartphone platform. It requires features such as location support for third-party apps and built-in navigation. In May, reports said Uber was looking at the mapping platform ‘HERE’, but the latest reports say Nokia would prefer to accept a bid from an alliance between three German car makers including BMW, Audi and Daimler.

On asking whether the company preferred bidders for the HERE high-definition maps business, Rajesh Suri told the magazine,

“Anybody who can improve the business in the long run is a good buyer.”