"Pekka" Florida License Plate
 

I'm looking for an old friend I knew in New York/New Jersey. His name is Pekka K. His last name was hard for me to pronounce and remember. It began with a K and it was started with Kon or Kor and had four syllables.
He moved back to Helsinki in the mid to late 80's with a new wife and a current model Red Corvette with Florida license plate that said "PEKKA" I'm not sure if he kept the car.
I would like to find and contact my old friend. Does this ring any bells with anyone?

John V.
Palm Beach, FL

Hi John, and welcome to the board!

I know only three Pekkas who own a Corvette and have lived in the USA:

Pekka Berkeles from California, VettePekka, and Pekka Leino. Pekka Leino has lived in Florida, at least, to the best of my knowledge :-k None of these three people is not necessarily the person that you're looking for.. I wish I could've helped you more.

Good luck with your search!

Hello John! I hope you can find your old friend! I do not know him, but I try to hel as much as I can. I remember an old story in an old finnish car magazine where a guy imported a new red C4 Corvette from USA when he moved back to Finland. I do not know if this is your guy though. I do not have old V8-Magazines at hand right now, but maybe somebody else can check the story for you! I think it was in late '84 or early '85.

About the surname, if it started with Kon- or Kor, it could be for example: Konttinen, Korpela, Kortelainen, just to name few. Do you remember any more about the last name? Did it end with -nen? That "suffix" is really common in finnish surnames.

Good luck to your search! I'm sure that someone from our old guys will remember your friend. These cars were really rare here at that time. ;)

I can check if I find that magazine on next weekend! ;)

Hello John!!

What a great mission to find your old friend.Do you have any pictures ? Any other friends who might remember more about this Pekka ? Do you have any how old he was during the stay in FL ?

Ill make some calls and get back to this.

Thanks for the help!
 

Pappatunturi:
No pics, but he was an avid tennis player, attended university in New York City. He worked for Nokia at that time(maybe still) and when I last saw him in St. Pete Florida around 86' he was in his early thirties.

corvette63:
Any luck with those old magazines?

Finnshark:
I checked my old phone books but could not find an entry. Some of the names like Kortelainen sound possible but I don't think I ever used his last name while we knew each other.

Thanks again all!
By the way, are all you guys in Finnland or just Finnish?

Regards,
John

John, I didn't remember check the old articles of V8-Magazine, but I promise that I will check those later, I try find them on next weekend if possible.

Nokia won't give their list of employees. But if here anybody works for Nokia, so maybe he/she can ask, if anybody knows something about Pekka Kortelainen.

John, I sent PM for you ;)

So far no luck with my investigations.I called one "old school" friend of mine who did modify almost all personally imported cars to meet finnish regulations during early 90s . However he promised to keep me informed if he gets any info about this. I think we really need to find him -this is a great story of corvette friendship !!

Almost every one of us lives in Finland. But we do have couple of originally finnish guys living in USA too in this forum! Maybe they will chime in when they notice this thread!

Pappatunturi: I agree with you, this mystery needs to be solved!

By the way, where Nokia had offices at that time? At least in Tampere and Otaniemi(?), anywhere else?

Corvette 63 ; Contact Ismo.I believe he still works for Nokia.

John ; Hold on there -we wont sleep until this is done:)

OK, so it was already spread all over the country. Even though mobile business was still in it's early years...

John, do you have any idea in which Nokia business area Pekka was working? In case he is still working for the same (or what it has become) business area. Might be easier to find him if our people at Nokia would know his business area. Nokia is such a huge company nowadays that it might be difficult to find one person from there...

Wow!
 

Thanks for the big response!!

Finshark, Pappatunturi, corvette63 & Peku22:

I think he worked for Nokia Mobira in the 85' to 87' in Bernardsville, NJ USA office.

I believe he was a firearms enthusiast and may have had some connection with Sako early in his career when it was owned by or part of Nokia Mobira.

I'm not sure about that last name, I want to say Kontrantada but that is just how I remember it(I hope I'm not butchering his name or Finnish honor).He may have gone back between 86' and 89'

Sorry about misspelling Findland in last post. I'm starting to feel like comming to Findland!

Thanks to all!

John

Hopefully you will get contact to your old friend John. Maybe the Kontrantada might be Kotiranta :confused: or something like that. Good luck for your search John :thumrigh:

Entinen nokialainen Pekka Kotiranta eteni Ericssonilla Euroopan, Lähi-idän ja Afrikan matkapuhelinmyynnistä vastaavaksi johtajaksi, mutta kuluttajat naureskelivat kolhoille kännyköille vaikka Kotiranta myi, myi ja myi. Lupaava ura lässähti potkuihin viime syksynä (2001). Kotiranta asuu tätä nykyä Tanskassa, vaimonsa kotimaassa.

Maybe it's this guy, at least nobody with this name works for nokia anymore. my free translation from the old news I found:

A former nokia emplyee Pekka Kotiranta made progress as he worked for Ericsson as a Europe, Middle East and Africa mobilephone sales executive person. The consumers laughed at the bulky phones, even though Kotiranta sold, sold and sold. Promising career ended last fall (2001). Nowdays Kotiranta lives in Danmark, which is his wife's homeland.

There's no Pekka Kortelainen working for Nokia today.

By the way, I checked how many "Pekka Kortelainen" you can find from Finnish telephone catalog "Fonecta". There was 39 hits...

Salo.....

That's right, I checked out those lists myself too! :-o

..And in Helsinki is a few Nokia's offices.. Mäkkylä, Karaportti, Pitäjänmäki, Keilaranta (Espoo) etc. etc. ;)

Yup, he still works for Nokia, but "Pekka Berkeles" told all necessery information :-k


:D

Warmer!
 

Nipa & Macho:

Kotiranta sounds very familiar and I believe he married a gal from Sweeden or maybe Denmark.....That could be it...

Further searching brings me alot of Finnish language hits.
Getting warmer!

John

I asked about those old V8-Magazines on the other Finnish Car Forum, and they said, that there is just a couple new C4's on '84-86.. And they didn't find any "Pekka" who owns new C4.. :-k

Is it him?
 

Corvette63:

Pekka Kotiranta; is that the name?

Your friend's name? I don't know, I just meant that I don't know any Pekka Kortelainen who works for Nokia ;)

Now we have find out is Pekka Kotiranta the man, what you are looking for!

Found Him!
 

Thank you everybody! I just got off the phone with my old friend. I could not have found him without the help from you guys! Thanks Alot.
Ciao!
John V.

Great! :thumrigh: Was it Pekka Kotiranta?

Wau ! This is amazing,John you got to tell us some more-was it fun talking to him?Does he still drive a corvette ?

Great! That's good news! :cool:

And most of all will you be coming to Finland for a visit? :thumrigh:

Last name is Kotiranta and it was great talking to him. You guys are gonna kill me but I did'nt ask about the Vette! I would love to go to Finland on my next trip to Europe. Who knows when but I haven't been over there in a while. I'm working on a project that brings me to South America from time to time. One never knows what the future holds!

Thanks again fellas!

John V.

Almost unbelievable that you find him:thumrigh:

Yes, in Finland we called it " reilu meininki " :):):)

Sounds great! :thumrigh:

Yes it is, glad we could help.