Microsoft's Silverlight browser plug-in will be bringing videos and other rich media to Nokia smartphones later this year.
The two companies on Tuesday at Microsoft's Mix '08 conference are scheduled to announce that Microsoft will write a version of Silverlight for Nokia's Series 60 (S60) smartphone software that runs on Symbian OS. The software, which will be available later this year, will also run on Series 40 devices and Nokia Internet tablets.
Silverlight videos are coming to Nokia's N96 smartphone.
(Credit: Nokia)For people with compatible devices, it means they will be able to see content, notably video, written for Silverlight, which Microsoft is pushing as an alternative to Adobe's Flash Player. Microsoft has been signing on content partners to use Silverlight for media streaming, including MLB.com and online Olympic games broadcasting with NBC.
For Microsoft, the deal with Nokia is a step in its pledge to make Silverlight "ubiquitous," that is, capable of running on multiple operating systems.
The software giant is trying to lure Web developers toward Silverlight--and away from Flash--to build rich Internet applications or media-oriented Web sites.
The strategy, which Microsoft detailed at last year's Mix conference, hinges on creating tools that let traditional Microsoft developers write Silverlight Web applications with familiar products like Visual Studio and ASP.Net.
Silverlight now runs on Windows and Mac OS, and it has a deal with Novell to build a distribution on Linux.
A version of Silverlight for Windows Mobile will be available later this year, said John Case, a general manager in Microsoft's developer division. "The whole Silverlight strategy is to provide one programming model and ubiquity," he said.
Microsoft chose to work with Nokia because it has the largest market share of mobile phones, but it will sign on with other handset makers to create ports of Silverlight, Case said.
All the main features of Silverlight, including video and interactive Web application development, will be included in all mobile versions.
But there will be some device-specific restraints, which means Microsoft will create editions of Silverlight for different mobile platforms, he said.
Sybase hit the $1 billion revenue mark in posting its year-end results Thursday--and we're not talking the number of hamburgers served, either.
But is meeting its milestone mark of $1 billion in revenues, along with soundly beating analysts' fourth quarter revenue and earnings forecasts, (as noted by The Street.com), enough to fight off a proxy battle with one of its largest shareholders, Sandell Asset Management.
Sandell wants Sybase to consider selling off its mobility business in an IPO, or even unloading all or part of the company via a sale. And to push the issue, Sandell wants to replace three of Sybase's nine directors, who will be up for re-election this year.
Although Sybase CEO John Chen declined to talk about Sandell or its proxy fight, he did note that Sybase's mobility business is a key growth driver for the company--not as an add-on business but rather something that's baked into its core.
Sybase's end game is to build an enterprise stack based on software to cater to corporate America's mobile workforce. It's looking to tie in mobile middleware and messaging into its core database business, while creating an enterprise mobile platform on top of which customers can put their mobile applications.
As a result, Sybase's plans are to be the software stack for enterprise mobility.
During the quarter that just closed, Sybase saw its mobile middleware business grow 22 percent year over year, and its messaging business climb 13 percent. Overall, the company's mobility business generated a total of about $91 million in the fourth quarter, representing less than a third of the $295.2 million it generated in the quarter.
Sybase is also looking to be the hunter--not just the hunted. Chen said don't be surprised to see the company make future acquisitions in the mobile commerce arena.
Today bluepulse, a free mobile social network, announced a platform shift that will give smartphone users access to the free service for the first time. Bluepulse is now Webware.
The bluepulse in-box stores incoming and outgoing messages, and status updates.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Until now, the strictly-mobile social network installed on JAD and JAR downloads to Java and Symbian cell phones, but wouldn't run on smartphones like Pocket PCs or Palm Treos. Migrating to a wholly Web-based app opens the door for smartphone users to take advantage of the service's instant messaging and social discovery mash-up.
In addition to making the switch to Web, bluepulse also adds an all-in-one message in-box and out-box that stores status updates, text messages, and friend requests in a single location, much like a Facebook feed. Another feature, group friending, applies the transitive property to help users connect to their friends' friends, thus extending their network.
Adding friends can now also be accomplished en masse through invitations to Facebook, AIM, Hotmail, Yahoo Messenger, Gmail, MSN, and MySpace contacts.
Users can join bluepulse by pointing their mobile browsers to http://www.bluepulse.com.
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