Symbian Limited has announced the formal launch of Symbian Signed, the industry-endorsed application signing program that promotes best practise in Symbian OS content and application development. The program tests applications against industry-agreed criteria in support of network operator and mobile manufacturer requirements. Symbian Signed is designed to satisfy mobile developers" needs and ensures a thriving, open market for trusted mobile applications by providing a single, low-cost and unified certification program. The program also delivers developer authentication and anti-tamper security for Symbian OS applications. More than 300 Symbian native C++ and Visual Basic application and their associated content have reached Symbian Signed status.

"With 12 million Symbian OS phones already in the market and Symbian OS phone sales rising more than 100% year-on-year in the last quarter, Symbian developers are creating third party applications at an increasingly rapid rate. Symbian Signed builds on Symbian"s existing support for application developers by creating even wider commercial opportunities for applications and faster routes to market that require less cost and effort," said Simon Garth, vice president, market development, Symbian.

Operators, application publishers and phone makers currently offer individual certification schemes resulting in extra cost for the industry and a more complex route to market for application developers. Symbian Signed provides a single signing scheme that can be used as an alternative to many of the individual schemes, reducing the cost and complexity of getting applications to market. As a result, handset manufacturers such as Nokia, Sendo and Sony Ericsson have today announced that they will be migrating their own signing programs to Symbian Signed.

Flexible Symbian Signed options

Symbian Signed offers flexible signing options to support the different needs of the Symbian OS ecosystem. These options are:

Test House Certification: Suitable for ISVs with a small number of applications. Applications are submitted to the Symbian Signed portal and tested by an independent third party test house

Self Certification: Suitable for ISVs with more than 15 of their own applications that require Symbian Signed status. ISVs or network operators certify their own applications through the re-use of internal, recognised Quality Assurance processes

Publisher Certification: Suitable for application publishers, Symbian OS licensees and network operators or any public software distribution portal owner. The publisher tests and certifies the application using its own quality assurance processes on behalf of the originating ISV

Powerful channel to market

Symbian Signed also supports a distribution channel for Symbian OS application developers, providing a powerful route to market with the main application vendors and distributors. Developers who achieve Symbian Signed will also be provided with rights to use the "For Symbian OS" logo.

Industry endorsed programme

Symbian worked with key developers, phone manufacturers, network operators and system integrators to develop http://www.symbian.com/press-office/2004/pr040223d.html]. The program is delivered with industry leading partners that have provided an automated and seamlessly integrated process. Cidercone Wireless Oy provides the intuitive and easy to navigate Symbian Signed portal website, Capgemini offers testing services for the independent test house route and Verisign offers Authenticated Content Signing (ACS) services, providing a means for the validation and acceptance of applications.

Richard Hanscott, vice president, business development and partnering, Orange Group said:

"The rapidly increasing number of Symbian OS phones in the market is creating a significant opportunity for the industry. Symbian Signed not only supports the needs of operators and customers but also delivers an accelerated route to market for Orange developers."

Harald Stadlbauer, vice president partner development and corporate venturing, T-Mobile, said:

"T-Mobile is pleased to support the aims of the Symbian Signed Program. Such initiatives are essential for the short and long term satisfaction of our customers and the mobile industry and therefore T-Mobile will seek to work closely with the industry to facilitate such activities. T-Mobile will be encouraging vendors and developers to adopt high quality standards for their applications."

Andrey Scherbakov, development director, Epocware said:

"We are excited to be involved in Symbian Signed as it provides a consistent criteria and process to greatly simplify how we certify applications across all Symbian OS phones."

Clint Patterson, vice president of marketing, Handango said:

"We are pleased to offer Symbian Signed to our software partners as part of our rich service offering. This innovative industry-endorsed program meets the market"s growing demand for certified applications. In support of Symbian Signed, we will offer preferential positioning to applications on our own download portals starting this summer."

Simon Jacobs, director of Xen Games Ltd said:

"Symbian Signed worked exactly as I would expect it to. There is nothing more I could suggest to improve the process. Symbian Signed will offer Xen Games Ltd a powerful route to market."

Lee Epting, vice president, Forum Nokia said:

"Nokia fully supports Symbian"s initiative and recommends Symbian Signed throughout Forum Nokia, our 1.4 million member developer community, and has begun the process of migrating Nokia"s application testing program, Nokia OK, to Symbian Signed. As of July 1st 2004 only tested applications will be accepted into Nokia channels."

Hugh Brogan, CEO, Sendo, said:

"Sendo"s end user and operator customers will benefit greatly from a choice of high quality, tested Symbian Signed applications. We support Symbian's simple standardized scheme and will encourage the developer community to support this initiative by migrating Sendo Check, Sendo"s own certification program, to Symbian Signed and will include the Symbian root certificate in our Symbian OS/Series 60 devices."

Anders Unosson, vice president applications & services mobile phones, Siemens Information and Communication Mobile Group, said:

"With its industry-wide support Symbian Signed will foster quality and best practice in the creation of applications for Symbian OS phones. The program delivers a solution to the real market requirement of industry wide testing and certification and also offers a more direct route to market for developers."

Ulf Wretling, director developer program, Sony Ericsson said:

"Sony Ericsson sees the Symbian Signed Program as a vital component to mature the market perception of Symbian OS as the premier choice for advanced phones. By making it easy and straightforward for developers to certify their applications, this effort will build a strong portfolio of trusted Symbian OS applications for our customers to enjoy. From January 1 2005, all new Symbian applications on Sony Ericsson portals will be required to be Symbian Signed."

Mal Postings, global mobility lead, Capgemini, said:

"Symbian Signed is exactly what is needed to ensure that more high quality applications enter the market place. It is not only about offering cost effective testing services, but ensuring that developers have access to testing houses that understand the context of mobile applications and are able to master the technology complexities of the mobile user experience."

Garry McCollum, CEO of Cibenix said:

"Cibenix is delighted to see the introduction of an efficient and flexible signing program from Symbian. This program allows us to signal the high quality and professional implementation of our operator and consumer product range across the broad array of Symbian OS phones available today."

Chad Kinzelberg, vice president, SSL, VeriSign said:

"VeriSign is excited to be working with Symbian in creating a safe and secure environment for deploying wireless applications and content. Symbian Signed allows wireless carriers to operate with the confidence that their network infrastructure is protected while ensuring their application development and distribution is never disrupted."

About Symbian Signed

Symbian Signed is the mobile industry endorsed certification program that promotes best practise in designing applications to run on Symbian OS phones. This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

Web: www.symbiansigned.com