Psion's smart move

Phone giants adopt software from hand-held specialist

MOBILE phone giants Ericsson, Nokia and Motorola have adopted software from UK hand-held computing specialist Psion for the development of the next generation of ?smart? mobile phones, writes Guy Clapperton.

Ericsson, Nokia and Motorola have joined the British company in a joint venture, called Symbian, which will incorporate the whole of Psion. The trio plan to ship phones based on Psion?s (now Symbian?s) EPOC operating system in competition with Microsoft?s Windows CE operating system. Psion will hold the controlling stake in Symbian, and Motorola will join the group this year.

Psion hopes the move will establish its operating system as an industry standard. The new devices are expected to ship over the next couple of years and will allow email, wireless Internet access, and video conferencing.

Competing products based on Microsoft?s Windows CE operating system have taken considerable market share from Psion, which issued a profit warning earlier this year following disappointing sales of hand-held computers.

John Davison, analyst with research company Ovum, regards the alliance as a major step forward but said: ?All the corporates we speak to say whatever a hand-held computer does, it must integrate with the desktop, it?s no use by itself. Given that Microsoft controls the desktop, that would be a very interesting battleground.?

Dilip Mistry, Microsoft?s Windows CE product manager, welcomes the competition as ?good for the industry?.