Symbian expands app development to China

LONDON, UK: China Mobile Communications Corporation (CMCC), a mobile network operator, and the Symbian Foundation today announced an agreement to collaborate on a series of key initiatives to improve the mobile ecosystem in China and to stimulate the development of the market for CCMC’s locally developed 3G network standard, TD-SCDMA.

The partnership also marks Symbian’s Chinese website launch, broader focus on the Chinese market and China Mobile’s determination to support the Symbian Foundation.

The first partnership initiative is the simplification of Symbian Signed testing services for developers submitting applications to CMCC’s newly launched application store, Mobile Market.

The inclusion of Symbian Signed services will allow CMCC to provide mobile developers with a one-stop facility for testing, signing and publishing their Symbian-based applications, said a press release.

Currently, more than 50 per cent of Mobile Market’s 2,000 applications are based on the Symbian platform. Mobile Market will also support applications published via Symbian’s new application publishing programme, Horizon.

“The Symbian platform holds a strong position in China’s mobile market and we welcome the opportunity to build our relationship with the Symbian Foundation,” commented Lu Xiang Dong, vice president at China Mobile.

“By entering this partnership with the foundation we hope to have greater involvement in the development of new and exciting mobile applications, thereby enabling developers to satisfy consumers’ 3G requirements via our Mobile Market store and enhancing the value chain for the TD-SCDMA industry,” he added.

Alongside this partnership, Symbian recently launched a Chinese version of its website to promote and support the adoption of the Symbian platform in the region: www.symbian.org/cn. The foundation has also laid out plans to establish an office and local operation in Beijing, further demonstrating Symbian’s growing investment in China.

This commitment to the Chinese market is supported by evidence of increasing interest in the foundation and the Symbian platform by developers and partners in the region, said the release.

“China Mobile has played a leading role in the development of mobile communications, not just in China but also on an international scale and we look forward to having them share their expertise with the growing Symbian community,” said Lee Williams, executive director of the Symbian Foundation.

He further said that the integration of Symbian Signed into CMCC’s developer programme and Mobile Market services will enable smoother access for Symbian developers to the largest mobile user base in the world.