OStatic

As we posted yesterday, Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and NTT Docomo announced today that they will unite the Symbian OS, S60, UIQ and MOAP(S) into one open source mobile software platform. In conjunction, a number of members have announced the Symbian Foundation, to oversee the new platform. Now, the LiMo Foundation--which has a Linux-based mobile platform that will arrive on many phones later this year--has issued a statement welcoming the Symbian Foundation. Will we in fact see fierce competition between these two entities?

There's more momentum on the mobile open source front. Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and NTT Docomo announced today that they will unite Symbian OS, S60, UIQ and MOAP(S) into one open mobile software platform. In addition, the Symbian Foundation is now formed, with many prominent early members, including AT&T, LG Electronics, Samsung, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Vodafone. Nokia will also buy out the remaining shares of Symbian Limited that it doesn't already own, for $410 million. Is Nokia only aiming to stop paying hefty Symbian license fees, or does this point to a promising new open source mobile platform? What does this mean for Linux phones?