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Dueling Software Is the Focus of Attention at a Mobile Phone Show

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Dueling Software Is the Focus of Attention at a Mobile Phone Show

By KEVIN J. O’BRIEN
Published: February 17, 2009
BARCELONA, Spain — At the world’s biggest mobile phone show, the buzz is about software.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/18/technology/personaltech/18cell.html#secondParagraph Josep Lago/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Steven A. Ballmer, chief executive of Microsoft.



While dozens of new smartphones are being introduced at Mobile World Congress here this week, the industry’s biggest players — and the newcomers that have shaken it up — are less likely to be promoting their latest devices than what makes them run.
Google, one of the newcomers, received a lift on Tuesday from Vodafone, the world’s largest mobile operator. Vodafone said that starting in March it will sell phones made by the HTC Corporation that use Google’s Android software in Britain, France, Germany, Spain and Italy.
The emergence of Android last year came after the arrival two years ago of the Apple iPhone, with its touch-screen control system, prompting a shake-up that has caused the more-entrenched players to step up their efforts.
“Apple and Google have shown that with the right user interface, with the right environment in the phone, you can generate significant consumer interest and usage of the device,” said Jörgen Lantto, vice president for mobile platforms at ST-Ericsson, the cellphone equipment maker.
Microsoft, the world’s biggest software maker, said Monday that it had reached a deal under which LG Electronics of South Korea would use the Microsoft mobile operating system in 50 of its smartphones.
“Strategically, phones are very interesting,” Steven A. Ballmer, the Microsoft chief executive, said in an interview. “Financially, phones are very interesting. It’s a big, big deal for us.”
Nokia, creator of the leading cellphone operating software, this week introduced two more smartphones that will use its Symbian platform, and Research in Motion, whose operating system trails only Symbian in number of users, said it would continue to promote its operating system for use on non-BlackBerry devices.
Yahoo announced a revamped mobile operating system available on the Web and as an application for the iPhone.
The shifting focus to mobile operating systems has shaken up a market that had been dominated by Nokia, the Finnish cellphone maker, whose sales had helped make Symbian the de facto leader. Since Apple introduced the iPhone, and Google released its free, open-source Android system, Symbian’s lead has started to shrink.
At the end of 2008, Symbian’s share of the global market for mobile operating systems had fallen by almost a third from the end of 2005, to 52.4 percent from 74.3 percent, according to Canalys, a research firm in Reading, England.
Over the same period, RIM rose to 16.5 percent from 8.6 percent; Microsoft rose to 13.9 percent from 7.9 percent; and the iPhone grabbed 9.6 percent of the market.
“Symbian had dominated this market for a long time because there was really no one else focusing on smartphones except Nokia,” said Pete Cunningham, an analyst at Canalys. “But the momentum has changed.”
While Android controls less than 1 percent of the market, it represents the cutting edge of a move toward open-source software in the mobile business, said Jonathan Schwartz, chief executive of Sun Microsystems, which makes computer servers and distributes free desktop applications.
Because of the availability of free software like Android, “the days in which one company can dictate which operating system and which applications are used are numbered,” Mr. Schwartz said.
Andy Rubin, the director of Android engineering at Google, said that the company considered its mobile operating system — which is already available on HTC phones in the United States, Australia and Singapore — as a serious new business venture, not just another way to promote Google’s desktop search business.
“I think this is a major, serious source of new significant revenue for Google,” Mr. Rubin said.
Last year, Nokia acquired the part of Symbian that it did not already own and converted the company into a nonprofit foundation. Symbian intends to give away its operating system by June 2010, ending the practice of charging mobile manufacturers license fees to use it.
Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia’s chief executive, said that move will help Symbian withstand the competition. “The traction we have gained from the operators, from the industry partners, has been very gratifying,” Mr. Kallasvuo said. “Symbian is on the offensive.”
 
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