LONDON, October 21 /PRNewswire/ --
- Further semiconductor device manufacturers, service software developers and financial services firms reinforce the global appeal of the Symbian Foundation platform
On the first day of the 2008 Symbian Smartphone Show, the ten initial board members of the Symbian Foundation (ATT, LG Electronics, Motorola, Nokia, NTT DOCOMO, Samsung Electronics, Sony Ericsson, ST-NXP Wireless, Texas Instruments and Vodafone) have welcomed the latest supporters of the Symbian Foundation initiative.
We are delighted to see more than fifty companies now confirming their support for plans to create the world's most open platform for mobile devices, said Kris Rinne, senior vice president, architecture and planning, ATT on behalf of the initial board members. Plans to establish the foundation are proceeding as planned; we anticipate even stronger support by the time the foundation begins operations, which we expect to be during the first half of 2009. The Symbian Foundation platform offering will be the most proven and successful open mobile platform, which will be available royalty free for members from the foundation's first day of operations. Making the platform available in open source by June 2010 will only enhance its appeal to developers, solutions providers and network operators around the world.
Further support for the planned Symbian Foundation has come from 12 more companies, ARM, CIeNET, Flander, FUJISOFT, Huawei, Inmote, InnoPath Software, Red Bend, Scalado, Symsource, TRANGO Virtual Processors and Visa, who added their endorsements to the forty companies already announced as supporters of the foundation initiative.
The establishment of the Symbian Foundation will enable easier access to a proven mobile-rich operating system, enabling continuous innovation and development with leading-edge technology that we have come to expect within the mobile industry, said Ian Drew, VP Marketing, ARM. As the market leader in CPU architecture, ARM has a history of unleashing new features that enhance the user experience of operating systems and we look forward to continuing this with Symbian Foundation members in the future. We anticipate that our handset and semiconductor Partners will accelerate the introduction of new, higher performance devices built on the Symbian Foundation platform.
CIeNET believes the Symbian Foundation will greatly reduce time to market for both mobile phone manufacturers and application developers, said Julian Chen, Deputy GM at CIeNET Technologies. As the leading technical consulting company in the telecom and embedded field in China, CIeNET has already used Symbian OS, UIQ, and S60 software to deliver applications with best in class user experiences on various mobile phone models for our customers. We expect to leverage our mobile phone and application experience to serve our customers in China in the future, building on the Symbian Foundation platform.
Flander is pleased to join mobile industry leaders in supporting plans for the Symbian Foundation, which will drive new innovations in mobile for the benefit of customers around the world, said Markus Suomi, Flander CEO. Flander participates in all phases of smartphone software development and verification, from early planning and design to development and final validation. Our people have contributed in the Symbian ecosystem since the launch of the first Symbian OS based phones and our expertise in Symbian OS and S60 will benefit the community in the future.
FUJISOFT, as a major software development company for the Japanese mobile phone market, welcomes plans for the creation of the Symbian Foundation, said Minoru Yoshida, Executive Managing Director, FUJISOFT INCORPORATED. We are confident that the Symbian Foundation's plans to standardize mobile device platforms will transform the mobile phone market for the better. We believe that this will be a great opportunity for us not only to provide our experience and expertise to mobile phone manufacturers around the world, but also to contribute to the growth and development of the global ecosystem around the Symbian Foundation platform.
Huawei is excited by the plans for the Symbian Foundation, said Li Jilin, Huawei Communications Vice President. We look forward to participating in the work of the Symbian Foundation and using the foundation's platform to deliver a portfolio of devices for mobile network operators around the world. We believe that the Symbian Foundation ecosystem will enable innovation which will benefit users and drive increased customer satisfaction.
Inmote welcomes the Symbian Foundation initiative. This will be a new era for the foundation's platform, where more openness will drive new application concepts from a larger community of entrepreneurs and developers within the Symbian Foundation ecosystem, said Rene Heuven, CEO of Inmote. With our strong background in Symbian OS we expect increased demand for our training and consultancy services. Inmote is committed to joining the foundation and will continue to extend and improve its portfolio of training and development services for the Symbian Foundation platform.
InnoPath Software welcomes plans to create the Symbian Foundation, with its goals of furthering the availability of feature-rich mobile phones for the global market by building on the platform's strong installed base and developer community, said John Fazio, President and CEO. InnoPath, currently a member of the Symbian Platinum Partner Program and an industry leader in end-to-end Mobile Device Management, offers solutions both for wireless operators and device manufacturers. InnoPath's Mobile Device Management, deployed on Symbian OS-based phones today, allows operators to offer better customer care at lower cost and with greater user satisfaction.
Red Bend believes that the Symbian Foundation will create an open software platform that will raise the bar for mobile applications and services, said Morten Grauballe, EVP Platforms Ecosystem at Red Bend. As the leading provider of firmware over-the-air (FOTA) software for Symbian OS-based handsets, Red Bend intends to join the foundation. Our expertise will enable foundation members to open up new revenue streams, by delivering the next generation of features, applications and services over the air to consumers using devices built on the Symbian Foundation platform.
Scalado supports plans for the Symbian Foundation, said Mats Jacobson, CEO of Scalado. As an established part of the Symbian ecosystem, Scalado will bring best in class imaging technology to ensure that the Symbian Foundation platform can provide superior imaging experience and performance for end users. Additionally, Scalado will strengthen its RD to optimize imaging software technologies for the Symbian Foundation platform, so that the whole image chain, from sensor to applications will provide world leading imaging experience and digital still camera performance. We believe this will help the Symbian Foundation platform to become a unified, strong, complete and accessible OS that will be the platform of choice for future smart camera phones.
Symsource has been an enthusiastic proponent of plans for the Symbian Foundation since their announcement and we congratulate the mobile leaders behind this initiative, said Tim Ocock, VP, Business Development at Symsource. This visionary move will act as a catalyst for the mobile software ecosystem in expanding the kinds of innovative devices, products and services that can be created. As a boutique mobile development practice with the highest proportion of Accredited Symbian Developers amongst our peers we will be ideally placed to help members of the Symbian Foundation ecosystem fulfill their mobile aspirations.
TRANGO Virtual Processors is an enthusiastic supporter of the foundation's vision of an open, complete, and royalty-free software platform for mobile communications, said Brad Suessmith, TRANGO Senior VP and GM. OEMs, carriers and software developers will all benefit from growth of the existing strong support base for Symbian OS. Most importantly, consumers will have a wider range of solutions to choose from, available from the newly expanded ecosystem. We expect that TRANGO's history of providing enhanced security and portability will contribute greatly to the rapid adoption and continued success of the foundation's open platform.
Visa is excited by the plans for the Symbian Foundation, said Tim Attinger, Head of Global Product Innovation and Development at Visa Inc. Visa's strategy in creating mobile payment services applies the scale and flexibility of its global payment network to deliver payments and value-added services on mobile devices that have immediate value to consumers, merchants, and issuers. Over the last two years, Visa has actively engaged with financial institutions, wireless operators, handset manufacturers, and technology providers to develop and test mobile payments and services, ranging from payments, money transfer services, transaction alerts, merchant offers, and an ATM and store locator service. We believe that the Symbian Foundation platform has the potential to accelerate the delivery of those services to consumers around the globe.
Since plans for the Symbian Foundation were announced, hundreds of organizations have registered their interest in joining the foundation via the website at http://www.symbianfoundation.org.
As previously announced, the plans for the establishment of the Symbian Foundation and royalty-free licensing of foundation software are:
1. The acquisition of Symbian Limited by Nokia, expected to close in Q4, 2008, subject to regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. 2. Software assets are contributed to the foundation, including Symbian OS(TM) and S60 by Nokia, UIQ technology by Motorola and Sony Ericsson and MOAP(S) by NTT DOCOMO and Fujitsu. 3. This contributed software will be available under a royalty-free license to foundation members from the first day of Symbian Foundation operations, expected 1H 2009. 4. The Foundation will work to unify the platform, with the first unified foundation release expected in 2009. 5. The foundation will work to make the platform available in open source by June 2010 (two years from the Symbian Foundation announcement).
Notes for editors:
Further information about the Symbian Foundation is available at http://www.symbianfoundation.org.
The initial board members of the Symbian Foundation will be represented at the Symbian Smartphone Show at Earl's Court 2 in London, UK from Tuesday October 21 to Wednesday October 22. For more information about the show, please visit http://www.smartphoneshow.com.
Symbian and all Symbian based trademarks and logos are trademarks of Symbian Software Limited. The operation of the proposed Symbian Foundation remains subject to regulatory approvals. Until such approvals are obtained, and the Symbian Foundation has become fully operational, Symbian Software Limited retains exclusive responsibility for all licensing and marketing activities related to Symbian OS.
About the Symbian Foundation
On June 24, 2008, mobile industry leaders announced their intent to create the Symbian Foundation, with membership open to all organizations. At the same time, Nokia announced its offer to acquire Symbian Limited. Following the close of that acquisition, Nokia will contribute Symbian OS and S60 software to the Foundation. Sony Ericsson and Motorola will contribute technology from UIQ and DOCOMO and Fujitsu have indicated their willingness to contribute MOAP(S) assets.
The contributed software will be available for all foundation members under a royalty-free license, from the foundation's first day of operations, expected to be during the first half of 2009, dependent upon the close of the acquisition of Symbian Limited by Nokia, expected in the fourth quarter of 2008. From these contributions, the foundation will then provide a unified platform with a single UI framework. The foundation will make selected components available as open source at launch and then work to establish the most complete mobile software offering available in open source.
The foundation's platform will build on Symbian OS, today's leading open mobile software operating system with more than 200 million mobile phones already shipped by multiple vendors across more than 250 major network operators and with tens of thousands of third-party applications already available for these devices.
The foundation software licensing model and governance has been selected to secure transparency, encourage contribution and maintain platform consistency. The foundation will promote collaboration, contributions and active participation and will operate as a meritocracy. Device manufacturers will be eligible for seats based on number of Symbian Foundation platform-based devices shipped, with the other board members selected by election and contribution. Only one seat will be available per organization on the board of directors and each of the councils.
Web site: http://www.att.com http://www.symbianfoundation.org http://www.smartphoneshow.com
Mark Siegel, Executive Director, Media and Industry Analyst Relations of ATT Mobility, +1-404-986-1803, wireless, +1-404-345-3673, on behalf of the initial Symbian Foundation board members; or Karen Hamblen of Symbian Media Relations, +44-20-7154-1707, karen.hamblen@symbian.com, for Symbian Limited
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