Nokia Acquires Symbian; Takes on Google's Android
Nokia isn't finished with its acquisition spree just yet. Tonight the Finnish company announced a plan to acquire the 52 per cent of Symbian it doesn't already own and make the platform open source. Nokia clearly aims to challenge Android, the open source mobile operating system of Google. Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo says that it wants to create "the most attractive platform for mobile innovation and drive the development of new and compelling web-enabled applications".
The Symbian operating system is currently the leading open platform and it powers Nokia's smartphones, as well as those of a large number of other hardware manufacturers.
All of the major stakeholders in Symbian, including Sony Ericsson, Panasonic, and Siemens, have accepted the offer, representing approximately 91% of the Symbian shares. Nokia doesn't have a definitive answer form Samsung Electronics yet, but expects them to accept the offer as well.
As Techcraver.com points out, part of this move might be an answer to the delays Google's Android operating system is currently experiencing. But at the same time, this could also be driven by Nokia wanting to have more control over both the hardware and software side of its business, similar to how Apple has created its own operating system for the iPhone.
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Finally
Posted by: Roger Chen
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June 24, 2008 1:28 AM
Google Android keeps on getting pounded by bad press. Nokia's making very big moves today.
Posted by: Ben Parr
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June 24, 2008 1:38 AM
How is this bad press for Android? Nokia appears to be playing defense against a mobile OS that has not even launched yet. I don't think Nokia will be able to diminish Android's momentum with this move and I'd expect Symbian to slowly fade away.
Posted by: scott anderson
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June 24, 2008 1:59 AM
Only time will tell whether this is good or bad for Android. There's no way of telling at this stage. I don't see why Symbian would fade away automatically - I would imainge there will be a few years of battle for dominance, then we'll see.
Posted by: Ivan Pope
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June 24, 2008 2:04 AM
Delays in google? Strange. Anyway, this news makes me realize that nokia is really powerful. In fact, in the country where I came from, Nokia dominates the market. Here in Italy however, i do not find Nokia as powerful although it has a very big market share as well. Samsung is the one I find here with a really good market. This is just plain observation though, no stats present.
How much is this going to cost?
I'm betting on android being used by cheap Chinese mobile makers to commoditize the mobile set market. Nokia will then have to fight it out with iPhone in the high end market. Oh, good luck with Symbian, dont think it'll catch on in the opensource community though
Interesting news, and Nokia's acquisition of Trolltech should help greatly in developing new apps for the OS.
The word "control" in the third paragraph is a relative term -- iPhone's success is due in large part to Apple's opening up their OS to third party apps and development.
Um, Google Android, with no phones in existence, must respond TO Nokia, with millions (billions?) of devices in play -- not the other way around!
That's a really backward (and wrong-headed and Web/U.S.-centric) way to parse what Nokia is doing here.
This operation benefits more to Samsung and Sony Ericsson that can get rid of Symbian in their handsets and go Android.
Symbian usability is really poor. Nokia should better fix it soon
http://tech-talk.biz/2008/06/23/nokia-still-dont-get-it/
This is great for the consumer we will have more choices and better quality apps.
Wow! that's g8 news and answer to google android.What other companies like Samsung,Lg,Sony Ericsson etc will use then?Google android or symbian?See also some tech news in my site
http://www.shoeseat.com
From the Nokia press release:
"Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and NTT DOCOMO announced today their intent to unite Symbian OS(TM), S60, UIQ and MOAP(S) to create one open mobile software platform. Together with AT&T, LG Electronics, Samsung Electronics, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Vodafone they plan to establish the Symbian Foundation to extend the appeal of this unified software platform."
Woah, this is already a very high percentage of the mobile market worldwide. With all the big guns jumping on this bandwagon, I think Google Android may be in a bit of trouble here.
More analysis over at RWW network blog last100
Or they just want to stop MS Windows Mobile...
The real heat will come from mobile, Nokia's move is logical given the iPhone, win mob, android, linux plays....
It's pretty weird comparing the market leader to a yet-to-be-launched platform. No matter how promising ANdroid is on paper, IMHO you can't comment on anything until they send out the actual mobile phones to the market.