Divorzio tra Sendo e Microsoft: Z100, addio...

Sendo e Nokia hanno emesso nella giornata di ieri una press-release congiunta nella quale annunciano che Nokia ha fornito in licenza l'utilizzo della piattaforma Serie 60 di Symbian a Sendo.

La notizia è particolarmente importante, poichè sta a significare che lo smartphone Z100, che ormai era prossimo al rilascio nei canali di vendita, non sarà immesso sul mercato dal momento che il programma di sviluppo del cellulare, con il sistema operativo di Microsoft, è stato bloccato.

Sendo, a questo punto, abbandona la collaborazione con la casa di Redmond, per passare al sistema open source dell'azienda finlandese.

Non nascondiamo una certa amarezza per il mancato lancio del prodotto, soprattutto dopo aver assisitito alla dimostrazione in anteprima dello Smartphone Z100 in occasione di SMAU 2002.

Di seguito il comunicato ufficiale:

"Sendo, a British mobile phone manufacturer, today announced that the company has decided to license Series 60 Platform from Nokia for its smart phone category. The Series 60 is a software platform for feature- and application rich smart phones that Nokia licenses to mobile handset manufacturers. The platform is optimised to run on top of the Symbian OS. Sendo joins as the newest member to the Series 60 licensing community with Matsushita, Samsung, Siemens and Nokia.

 

“Earlier this fall we reviewed our smart phone strategy. While our mission of providing customers with feature-rich and ubiquitous devices remains unaltered, seeing that the Series 60 fully embraces both our mission and the new strategy we decided to approach Nokia,“ said Hugh Brogan, Chief Executive Officer of Sendo Holdings Plc. “The platform utilises open standards and technologies, such as MMS and Java(TM), jointly developed by the industry. The platform is robust, yet uniquely flexible, bringing great benefits to licensees, operators, developers and consumers.”

 

“We welcome Sendo, a pioneer in smart phone development, to join our Series 60 community. We see that a combination of Sendo’s technical expertise and growing market presence will bring significant contribution to the mobile market with Series 60 devices. Interoperable solutions that are built on open and common industry standards are proving to be the winning formula in meeting demands of business users and consumers alike," said Niklas Savander, Vice President and General Manager, Nokia Mobile Software.

 

Nokia licenses Series 60 Platform as a source code. The model enables licensees to contribute to the development of the platform while fully executing their individual business strategy, brand and customer requirements in fast developing and highly competitive mobile communications market. Licensees will be able to include the Series 60 into their own smart phone designs, thus speeding up the rollout of new phone models at lower costs.

 

The Series 60 is a comprehensive software platform for smart phones, created for mobile phone users that demand easy-to-use, one-hand operated handsets with high-quality colour screens, rich communications and enhanced applications. The Series 60 platform consists of the key telephony and personal information management applications, the browser and messaging clients, as well as a complete and modifiable user interface, all designed to run on top of the Symbian OS, an operating system for advanced, data enabled mobile phones."