What happened Shares of Nokia (NYSE: NOK) jumped 11% on Thursday after the telecom equipment maker delivered surprisingly strong first-quarter results. So what Nokia's net sales rose 3% year over year -- and 9% when excluding the impact of currency fluctuations -- to 5.1 billion euros ($6.2 billion). This growth was fueled in part by 5G-related gains in Nokia's network infrastructure and mobile networks businesses. Enterprise sales were particularly strong. New customer additions helped to drive a 14% (18% in constant currency) increase in revenue in this key segment. Investors bid up Nokia's stock price on Thursday. Image source: Getty Images. Better still, Nokia's profitability improved as its sales mix shifted toward higher-margin 5G products and its efficiency initiatives took hold. Nokia's gross margin rose 2.6 percentage points to 37.9%, while its operating margin came in at 8.5%, up from negative 1.5% in the year-ago period. All told, Nokia's comparable net profit increased more than 11-fold to 375 million euros ($455 million). That was well above analysts' estimates for adjusted profit of 90 million euros. Now what Management maintained its full-year financial forecast for revenue of 20.6 billion to 21.8 billion euros ($25 billion to $26.4 billion). But CEO Pekka Lundmark said Nokia's strong first-quarter performance makes it more likely to achieve the high end of its 7% to 10% operating margin target. "Today's results demonstrate that we are on track to deliver on our three-phased plan to achieve sustainable, profitable growth and technology leadership," Lundmark said. 10 stocks we like better than NokiaWhen investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now... and Nokia wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys. See the 10 stocks *Stock Advisor returns as of February 24, 2021 Joe Tenebruso has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.Source