Symbian Foundation
Description
"Now Nokia, which has owned a controlling stake in London-based Symbian Ltd. for several years, seems ready to shape the development operation up to deal with the challenges posed by Google’s Android platform, mobile Linux from the LiMo Foundation, Apple’s iPhone, a forthcoming version of Windows Mobile, and maybe even a reconstituted Palm OS.
Nokia announced today that it was buying the shares of Nokia that its doesn't already own. But instead of absorbing the software operation, it is turning its intellectual property over to the newly formed Symbian Foundation. Handset makers Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Samsung, and LG Electronics, carriers Vodafone, NTT DoCoMo, and AT&T, a chipmakers Texas Instruments and STMicroelectronics are also contributing assets to the foundation.
One model for the Symbian Foundation might be the success of the Mozilla Foundation, which began with AOL's donation of Netscape's code. This, of course, developed into the open source Firefox browser. But it's not yet clear just how much of the now-proprietary Symbian code will become open.
If a smartphone is defined as a handset with an open operating system that allows users to install the applications of their choice, Symbian has somewhere between 50% and 60% of the world market, depending on who is doing the counting. Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, and Palm are distant runners up." (http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2008/06/nokia_gets_symb.html?)