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Samsung isn’t making any more Symbian phones, the Korean supermanufacturer has announced, following Sony Ericsson in concentrating its efforts on other platforms like Android and Windows Phone 7.
The world’s second-biggest phone maker announced it won’t be supporting Symbian any more, in a note sent to registered developers. Samsung closed its Symbian lab two days ago and will close its Symbian forum on 30 December, with all Symbian-related content removed the following day.
Like Sony Ericsson, Samsung has decided the best course of action is to concentrate its efforts on Android and Windows Phone 7, as well as its own proprietary Bada platform.
Nokia is now the only manufacturer focusing energy on Symbian, but in our review of the new Nokia N8 we found its Symbian 3 upgrade a major disappointment. We’ve given the long-awaited N8 a middling three stars, and blame Symbian for many of its problems. It’s an improvement, but it’s not enough to compete with the latest releases from Apple and Google.
Where now for Nokia? The N8 was a long time in development, and we don’t have much hope for future devices such as the E7 that are based on the same software.
There’s been a rumour that Nokia is going to adopt Windows Phone 7, but more promisingly there’s also its work on MeeGo with Intel. Microsoft and RIM have realised they needed to start from scratch with their phone software, and Nokia’s best hope may be to do the same with MeeGo.
Symbian still has a huge share of the smart phone market, but it’s moving awfully quickly — Android phones, for instance, are now available at what used to be Symbian prices. With no more support from Samsung or Sony Ericsson, Symbian is certainly in trouble. Do you shed a tear for it? Is there any hope?
