“The possibilities are endless”

GLOBAL – That’s what Anand Chandrasekher of Intel’s Ultra Mobility Group said yesterday on the news of Nokia’s cooperation with Intel on device and chipset architectures for a new class of mobile computing devices. The collaboration is far-reaching, touching on Open Source technologies and bringing the best of portable computing power together with mobile communications to create new mobile Internet focussed devices. Stepping beyond today’s smartphones, notebooks and netbooks, the companies are expanding their longstanding relationship to help bring to life innovative hardware, software and mobile Internet services.

The first step in this exciting development is the creation of new device and chipset architectures. These will bring together high-bandwidth mobile broadband and powerful computing to create a new generation of devices which will see the Internet as ubiquitous. This is very much about bringing together the best of mobile computing and communications to create new experiences for the user. Always on Internet connections, user friendliness and a pocketable form factor will be some of the benefits we should expect to see.

Another element in the collaboration will be the cooperation in open source software initiatives. The companies will be coordinating their Open Source technology selection and development investments, enabling common technologies to be developed for their Moblin and Maemo platforms.

Intel will also be taking a license for Nokia’s HSPA/3G modem technologies to create new mobile broadband opportunities. These complement Intel’s existing offerings and the aim is to enable advanced mobile computing solutions with a wide range of communication capabilities.

This collaboration isn’t a deal to use Intel chips in Nokia devices, rather an expansion of an existing relationship designed to open up a new world of possibilities for mobile computing and connectivity. Of course, there’s no shortage of speculation as to what all this means in terms of devices. As ever, we don’t comment on rumour or speculation. That doesn’t mean we’re not as excited as you about the possible consequences though.