- Funds four Indian developers under the S$10million Open Screen Project Fund in Phase I. Invites more developers to submit applications in the second phase
- Releases Series 40 5th Edition ‘Lite’ SDK to Indian developers for high volume developer platform
Nokia today announced a series of new initiatives to assist Indian application developers tap global revenue generating opportunities at the Forum Nokia Developer Conference ’09, held in Bangalore. In another significant development, Nokia announced funding for four multi screen infotainment applications, viz., Bollywood Hungama, Eros Bollywood, India Today and Aaj Tak Videos, created by Indian developer companies and content aggregators, under the joint Open Screen Project Fund with Adobe in the first phase of selection. These applicatons have been selected through a stringent shortlisting process, from over 900 entries submitted from over 60 countries and will be available to consumers across the world through the Ovi Store later this month. Nokia further invited companies of all sizes to submit their entries to the Fund for the next phase.
Series 40 5th Edition, Feature Pack 1 Lite SDK
Nokia also announced the global release of a new software development kit (SDK) for its Series 40 mass market mobile devices, providing application developers with new tools to create unique applications and services for the high-volume feature phone market worldwide. While Series 40 is the world’s highest volume mobile developer platform, the Series 40 Lite devices represent some of Nokia’s most popular mass market devices. With this Nokia makes it easier for publishers and developers to create innovative applications for millions of mobile consumers being served by Nokia Series 40 Lite devices across the world. This SDK will also feature support for Indian regional languages like Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Punjabi, Marathi and Bengali.
“Mobile users everywhere are consuming more and more content daily. Considering that the next billion mobile users will be from emerging markets like India, our developers have the opportunity to not only shape local and global consumer mobile experiences but also lead the mobile applications ecosystem,” said D. Shivakumar, Vice President and Managing Director, Nokia India. He added, “Nokia India continues to invest heavily in its Services strategy and we encourage the 180,000 local Forum Nokia developer members to leverage off our investments and the market opportunity to innovate and create new revenue opportunities for themselves.”
According to Purnima Kochikar, Vice President, Forum Nokia and Developer Community, “India has the largest and most vibrant pool of qualified developers in the world. As the Internet is entering into the core of mobile experiences, we see unprecedented opportunities for Indian developers in shaping the future of mobile services. This is just the beginning. We will work in close collaboration with the large, talented developer base in India. Our goal is clear, and that is to make it effortless for our partners to create and market highly appealing, relevant applications that consumers globally will find indispensable. Our focus is on open collaboration with the ecosystem and we continue to invest in creating large scale revenue opportunities for application developers and as well as new powerful experiences for our consumers,”
Nokia also showcased to the Indian developer community the latest Linux based Maemo 5 OS that will help deliver a true PC like experience. Nokia believes that the next evolution of software will expand across platforms, providing applications for multiple platforms and devices from a single source code base, based on common skills and tools. With a cross-platform approach, Nokia’s goal is to make life easier for developers by bringing frameworks that will enable software written just once to work on more than one platform. The company will market and distribute successful applications developed on both Maemo and Symbian platforms through its Ovi Store globally. The Developer Conference was attended by 650 developers from across India and featured sessions from a host of Nokia and Industry experts.
Forum Nokia Code Competition for new Qt Mobility APIs
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The company also announced the Forum Nokia Code Competition for Qt Mobility APIs. The competition invites developers across the world to create code samples for Symbian that utilize Qt and Qt Mobility APIs The entries will be assessed on their innovativeness and usefulness by a board of Nokia technical and business development experts. Many examples will be chosen for publishing on to www.forum.nokia.com as a resource for the Forum Nokia community and to help accelerate the use of Qt even further. The grand prize winner will be nominated Forum Nokia Champion and receive a trip to the upcoming Nokia Forum Developer Summit to be held in San Francisco, California USA on June 9th and 10th, 2010. The competition encourages multiple entries and there will be other winners to be nominated as a Forum Nokia Champion as well as Nokia devices, Entries to the contest will be open from Dec 07, 2009 to January 31, 2010.
Over the last decade, Forum Nokia has been working extensively with the developer community in India, providing them with consumer insight/intelligence, open technology platforms and unparalleled reach and global distribution network to bring them at par with the international community. Today, Forum Nokia has over 180,000 registered developers in India and accounts for the single largest concentration of incoming web traffic on www.forum.nokia.com from any country.
About Forum Nokia
Nokia's global developer program, Forum Nokia connects developers to tools, technical information, support, and distribution channels they can use to build and market applications around the globe. From offices in the U.S., Europe, India, China, and Singapore, Forum Nokia provides technical and business development support to developers and operators to assist them in achieving their goal of successfully launching applications and services to consumers and enterprises. More information is available at www.forum.nokia.com.
About Open Screen Project Fund
The Open Screen Project Fund is a $10 million market development fund designed to accelerate the creation of applications, content and services that leverage the Adobe Flash Platform and run across mobile, desktop and consumer electronics handsets. Nokia and Adobe are the first contributors to the fund.
About Nokia
Nokia is the world’s number one manufacturer of mobile handsets by market share and a leader in the converging Internet and communications industries. We make a wide range of handsets for all major consumer segments and offer Internet services that enable people to experience music, maps, media, messaging and games. We also provide comprehensive digital map information through NAVTEQ and equipment, solutions and services for communications networks through Nokia Siemens Networks.