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Technology Stocks : COMS & the Ghost of USRX w/ other STUFF -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Moonray who wrote (16428)	6/25/1998 11:41:00 AM
From: Scrapps	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 22053

Wireless venture formed, taking on Microsoft By Roland Moller Wednesday June 24 6:32 PM EDT HELSINKI, Finland (Reuters) - The world's top three mobile phone makers teamed up Wednesday with British palmtop computer maker Psion Plc in a joint venture aimed at creating a device that could access the Internet and fit in a shirt pocket. In an apparent challenge to Microsoft Corp., Nokia of Finland and Sweden's Ericsson said they would form the joint venture with Psion. Motorola Inc. promised to join at a later stage. Psion stock surged 51 percent on the news, boosting the company's value to 318 million pounds ($530.7 million) vs. 210 million pounds ($350.5 million) on Tuesday. Nokia closed trading in Helsinki almost 3 percent higher at 373.60 markka. Ericsson shares were flat. Motorola rose $2.31 to $54.31 in composite New York Stock Exchange trading. The venture -- known as Symbian -- will develop user-friendly devices that could fit in a shirt pocket, combining computers and mobile phones, the companies said. Any technology developed would be made available to the venture's owners, as well as licensees. "The Symbian venture is a watershed deal for the industry, and lays the foundation of growth from an entirely new market with a vast range of devices," Psion Chairman David Potter said in an interview. "Putting intelligence on the mobile (telephone) network is where it's at," one analyst in London said. Industry sources and some analysts said the alliance, which plans to promote a non-Microsoft operating system, would hurt the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant's hopes of taking control of software standards for the palmtop computer industry. "It's clear that taking Microsoft software configurations and shrinking them to fit palmtops would be of no benefit to consumers or the industry," one source said. Palmtops, notably 3Com Corp.'s Palm Pilot, have proven highly successful. Microsoft is trying to make its Windows CE operating system software, a stripped-down version of its Windows operating system for personal computers, the standard for the devices. "We all believe ... that the handset market is going to show some explosive growth over the next 5 years," said Harel Kodesh, general manager of Microsoft's consumer appliance division. But he called it a "dramatization" to say the Psion venture changes the market greatly, noting that Windows CE already faces competition from many operating systems and platforms. "Most of the interesting work is still ahead of us," he said. "I wouldn't say we are locked out or locked in." Nokia said Symbian would aim to create a globally accepted platform for all hardware manufacturers based on Psion's EPOC palmtop operating system to allow Internet access, messaging and other information transmission. "It is our vision to establish EPOC as the software platform for the emerging wireless information device market," Psion's Potter said. EPOC is in direct competition with Windows CE. "This is a preemptive maneuver by Nokia, Ericsson and Motorola to try to keep Microsoft out of their business," telecommunications analyst Douglas Smith at Salomon Smith Barney, said. But he said the strategy could be risky because previous attempts to cut out Microsoft -- for example, by some personal computer makers -- proved fruitless. "It does put them in direct confrontation with Microsoft, and that has in the past been for other companies a dangerous strategy," Smith said. The new venture would establish new product categories, license wireless software, including EPOC, to all industry players and promote open standards for wireless information devices. Nokia, a leader in wireless computing since launching the world's first combined palmtop-mobile phone in 1995, said the venture was a major step toward its vision of an "unplugged" information society. Nokia Mobile Phones spokesman Tapio Hedman said the emergence of Symbian would further fuel the wireless computing revolution. "This move will enhance the development and coming of age of the wireless information society," Hedman told Reuters. "We very much believe in the future of the wireless information society ... and we believe in open standards and cooperation." The venture is another joint effort by technology giants and rivals to develop universal technologies. Archrivals Nokia and Ericsson were recently among the founders of an alliance dubbed Bluetooth for short-range wireless communication between electronic devices of all sorts, the first of which are expected to hit the market next year. Salomon's Smith said the deal was a clear victory for Psion. "It clearly is a tremendous achievement for Psion, it gives them much more of a financial backing and customer base," he said. "One of the concerns of Psion was certainly that they would be crushed by Microsoft, and now they have some important players on their team." Psion will initially own 40 percent of Symbian while Nokia and Ericsson will own 30 percent each. Motorola will take a stake later. Nokia's Hedman said the joint venture would not affect its earnings until the year 2000, after the first products on the EPOC platform have been launched.