Nokia and Intel have agreed to mash up their Maemo and Moblin platforms to create a single device OS called MeeGo.
MeeGo will be targeted at a variety of device segments, including smartphones, netbooks, tablets, Internet TVs and in-vehicle infotainment systems, Nokia announced Monday at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
The Linux-based MeeGo platform will be supported by Nokia’s “Qt” apps development environment. Developers can use Qt to create apps for multiple MeeGo devices and market them through both Nokia's Ovi Store and Intel’s AppUp Center.
The first release of MeeGo is scheduled for Q210, with devices launching later in the year.
The MeeGo launch follows Nokia and Intel’s announcement in June last year to work together on mobile chipsets, software and hardware.
Malik Saadi-Kamal, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media, pegged MeeGo as a “direct reaction to the deepening Google/Qualcomm alliance for integrating Android and Chrome with Qualcomm's Snapdragon platform.”
“Today about three-quarters of Android devices are powered by Qualcomm chipsets. The integration of Moblin and Maemo would give Intel's competing platform, Atom, the edge in the connected space beyond traditional netbooks,” Saadi-Kamal told telecomasia.net.
Nokia chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said MeeGo’s open-source credentials will “create an ecosystem that is second to none”.
However, that doesn’t mean MeeGo is intended to replace Nokia’s Symbian OS. A Nokia spokesperson said MeeGo was a complement rather than a competitor to Symbian, which will still be used for smartphones.
As if to emphasize the point, the Symbian Foundation simultaneously announced the release of the first open-source version of its platform, Symbian^3, which promises faster networking, acceleration for 2D and 3D graphics in games and applications, HDMI support, music store integration, multi-touch gesture support and the ability to run more apps simultaneously.
However, Symbian^3’s code won’t be completed until next month.