Wednesday, 7 February 2007

Trolltech Partners with VirtualLogix to Bring Linux to Mass Market Feature Phones

Trolltech and VirtualLogix have integrated Trolltech’s Qtopia platform for Linux handsets and VirtualLogix’s VLX software on a single-core processor. Trolltech, the company that makes software faster to build and easier to use, and VirtualLogix have formed a partnership, and will be demonstrating the single-core processor form-factor at 3GSM, the company said.

The partnership yields its first results at 3GSM where the demonstration will show VirtualLogix's VLX real-time virtualisation software integrated with Trolltech's Qtopia platform on a single ARM9 processor core. By running Qtopia and its Linux host, together with the radio modem stack and its RTOS host, on a single core within a mobile phone form factor, the companies demonstrate that Linux can be introduced into low-cost, high volume feature phones, the company added.

To date, the cost of dual-core processors has limited handset manufacturers’ ability to ship Linux-based mass market feature phones. Nomura Equity Research estimates that Linux on feature phones will claim 12per cent of the overall feature phone market by 2009.

The appeal of an alternative to proprietary systems and the ability to customise the user experience has made Linux the fasted growing OS for mobile phones. To date, more than five million mobile phones have been shipped in the market running Linux with Qtopia. Now, with a single-core processor, the mass market feature phone is the next segment for the Linux operating system, the company continued.

"Bringing Linux and Qtopia into mobile handsets can be a competitive weapon for OEMs to leverage the open, fast developing Linux ecosystem and deliver rich functionality to the market", said Mark Milligan, vice president of marketing at VirtualLogix.