Nokia Acquires Novarra To Improve Mobile Browsing Capability
The latest Nokia news is that on Friday, the company announced its plans to acquire a privately-held company in Chicago, Novarra, that specializes in mobile browsing.
Novarra’s technology can compress and reformat websites for Nokia’s cheaper forms that cannot display them in their original format. This will enable Nokia to greatly enhance the net browsing experience on its less expensive phones including those based on the Series 40 platform.
The primary results will most probably be available in the latter half of the year, as per a statement from the Finnish company. Nokia hasn’t provided any financial details of the acquisition. By the second quarter of 2010, however, Novarra and the over 100 people who work with it will function as a subsidiary unit of Nokia.
The domain of mobile browsing has caught up immensely in the last few moths. This week, Opera Software submitted the iPhone version of its Mini Browser for approval from the App Store. Mozilla, too has taken a decision to cease the development of one of the versions of its Firefox web browser. It has instead decided to focus on its upcoming version of Firefox for phones based on Android technology as well as concentrate on the existing version of the browser, Maemo, the OS used by Nokia’s N900.
Nokia’s decision to take over Novarra is seen as a step towards upping mobile net browsing in developing markets. Mobile Internet access is growing fast in the developed world due to the raging popularity of smartphones. Researchers feel that web browsing on phones will not grow so fast in the emerging markets unless phone manufacturers and operators bring Internet access and Internet services to cheaper devices. Nokia’s deal with Novarra seems to be a decisive step in this direction.
You can post your comments on Technology news to us.
