The Year Everything Changed?

Welcome to the SymbianOne round up of 2007 and preview of 2008. 2007 is a year that could go down as a significant turning point in the battle for mobile OS supremacy ... or so much of the mainstream press would have us believe.

So let's first look at these stories.

The Apple iPhone launched to a wave of hysterical fervor usually reserved for rock stars. Apple certainly managed to out PR everyone in the industry with the launch. The device has gone on to sell well and take a reported 25% share of the US market; second only to RIM. However, whether the iPhone proves to be seismic still awaits to be seen. Apple have been touted before and, while it has built a viable business, failed to take a significant market share globally. The iPhone is a constrained design much like the iPod, which until it got touch was little more than the same product repackaged to create demand. It will be in 2008 that iPhone shows what metal it has, as distribution goes global and iPhone 2 appears. SymbianOne's prediction is that, while the iPhone will sell well, it will ultimately be a marginal product.

The second big story was Google's Android. Highly anticipated as the gPhone, it turned out to be a Linux based featurephone platform, not a true smartphone competitor as the only development option is a rather non-standard version of Java. While subject to the same media hoopla as the iPhone, the challenges for Android are significant and ultimately these challenges come down to cost. Android is being positioned as a replacement for the many proprietary operating systems used by mobile phone manufacturers. The problem with displacing these operating systems is simple: manufacturers already have hundreds if not thousands of engineers who know the in house OS along with the systems for building phones on these OSs. Even if Android is free, the cost of retraining and retooling to make use of it may be prohibitive. Even for a green field implementation, there is a global lack of embedded Linux developers that will hamper rapid deployment. This has essentially been the issue facing most Linux initiatives. True, Google has the resources to push Android over the long term, but this may still not be enough. SymbianOne's prediction is that Android will struggle to make headway in 2008.

So while many mainstream technology pundits see the mobile landscape as having changed in 2007, the changes may ultimately prove to be less significant than they expect.

So what happen in 2007 that will have a big intact in 2008 - read on to see some of the top stories in the Symbian world and how they will affect 2008 ....

January

P.I.P.S: Opening Symbian OS for C Developers - The increasing power of the hardware available for mobile devices continues to open up new possibilities for application development. P.I.P.S., which formed the basis of Nokia's Open C released later in the year, starts the process of opening Symbian OS to a broader community of C/C++ developers. Expect to see this process accelerate in 2008.

February

UIQ Unleashed: An Interview with Johan Sandberg - The purchase of UIQ Technology by Sony Ericsson triggered a number of changes during the year. The purchase gave UIQ Technology added strength even before Motorola took a half share. 2008 will undoubtedly see UIQ growing its profile significantly.

March

Symbian OS v9.5: More Than A Free Mobile Performance Lunch - Although hardware improves, software has its part to play in delivering improved performance. Although nominally part of release 9.5, technologies &emdash; such as demand paging &emdash; are already appearing on Symbian devices even though no 9.5 devices (or platforms) have been announced. The modular, object orientated architecture of Symbian OS means "future" release features will continue to trickle down to "current" devices in 2008.

April

Readying Symbian for Microsoft Developers - One of key appeals of Symbian OS to developers is the choice of development options &emdash; C/C++, Java, Python, Web, etc. In 2008 Symbian devices will be able to host applications written by Microsoft and Palm developers.

May

Symbian By The Numbers - Volume, volume, and more volume. Symbian devices have continued to ship in ever greater numbers during 2007. In 2008 it is likely that over 100 million new Symbian devices will ship and the cumulative shipments could top 300 million.

June

TC TrustCenter Switch Benefits Developers - The move to TC TrustCenter for developer's Publisher IDs, an essential prerequisite for gaining Symbian Signed, was the start of changes to Symbian Signed. These changes makes certification less costly and easier for most developers. With one mobile phone in ten soon to be a Symbian device, 2008 will see many new applications for Symbian devices.

July

Scalado: When Image Matters - Specialist mobile developers are a key part of the Symbian ecosystem and the wireless ecosystem in general. Scalado is an example of an increasing number of key specialist suppliers to the mobile software industry. However, 2008 could see a number of these specialists become the subject of takeover as mobile phone manufacturers look further for differentiation.

August

iAnywhere: Collaboration on Symbian Devices - While Symbian has always had strength in the consumer market an increasing number of business infrastructure suppliers are realizing Symbian devices are making their impact in enterprise. 2008 will see the battle for the business hot up as the sheer volume of Symbian devices starts to squeeze the traditional suppliers.

September

Sony Ericsson Application Shop: More Than Just Selling - For third-party developers the key to success is sales, in turn the key to sales is user education. For companies like Sony Ericsson offering a channel for application sales is as much about education as it is revenue. 2008 is going to see a far greater emphasis on third-party applications as a key differentiator for Symbian devices.

October

Symbian Accelerates Graphics and Data - It took Symbian less than 18 months to re-architect its UI stack to offers full hardware accelerated 3D graphics within the UI. As the mobile platform market becomes more crowded, Symbian will be making operating system announcements at an accelerated pace in 2008.

November

UIQ: The Complete Guide - From Paper to Community - For developers the buzz word of 2007 has been "communities". Forum Nokia jumped on the bandwagon with a new front end to its Wiki, forums and blogs. UIQ is taking the idea a step further by offering it community of developers a professionally developed starting point. Expect to see every Symbian developer program move further in harnessing their respective communities in 2008.

December

Nokia Open C Challenge Opens Opportunities For Mobile Developers - And the year go full circle finishing with the Open C Challenge highlighting the broad options for creating applications on Symbian phones.

As we move into 2008 much has changed and much has remained the some. The challenges for Symbian have not been significantly altered by the emergence of the iPhone and Android. While many are preoccupied with the relative position of the various smartphone operating systems the real challenge is migrating the mobile phone to the smartphone and creating a viable industry for third-parties around it. Only then will the relative market share for each OS be a true measure of success or failure.

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