By Tim Ferguson, 10 April 2007 10:00
NEWS
The number of mobile phones running on Linux is predicted to rocket in the next five years, with more than 200 million in use by 2012 - up from just 8.1 million currently.
Cheat Sheets
♦ Mobile location-based services
♦ FMC
♦ 3G
Linux take-up has traditionally trailed compared to the big daddy of mobile OS platforms: Symbian - thought to have more than 60 per cent market share. But this is about to change, according to ABI research.
Stuart Carlaw, research director at ABI, said a number of barriers to Linux taking off are disappearing with industry bodies working to promote the open source OS.
There are also an increasing number of environments available for Linux application development - such as Trolltech's Greensuite.
In addition to these factors, Carlaw said many phone makers and mobile operators want to customise their handsets and Linux fits the bill much more than Microsoft or Symbian. "There's a lot of carrier support for it as well," he said.
Carlaw added it's not a question of 'if' but 'when' mobile Linux will take off.
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1. Osay Yuuni
Well it's about time! The advantages of Linux in embedded solutions cannot have escaped the eyes of manufacturers. From satellite receivers to routers we have seen that Linux lends itself to customization that best fits the customers needs. Geeky customers are able to add value to products built on Linux which invariably goes back into the product for general customer benefit.