Los Angeles — Finland-based Nokia, the world’s largest mobile phones maker announced on Friday that it has agreed to acquire the privately-held, Chicago-based Novarra, makers of the Vision mobile browser and server platform, enabling it to introduce a new service by employing the company’s Internet services technology in smartphones. The acquisition turns Nokia into the increasingly contentious mobile browser battle.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but according to the handset vendor, it has accepted to purchase all of the outstanding shares of Novarra, Inc., a privately-held company based in Chicago, IL.
In a statement about the acquisition, Nokia declares “Novarra’s mobile browser and services platform will be employed by Nokia to deliver improved Internet experiences on Nokia mobile devices.” Novarra will enable Nokia to offer an better mobile Web experience to customers. However, the Novarra acquisition will probably have little effect on customers in the United States.
“By driving innovation in all segments of our portfolio, we are building one of the largest consumer audiences for web services and content,” said Nokia EVP for service Niklas Savander on Friday. “Novarra’s Internet services technology delivered on the world’s most widely-used mobile platform, Nokia’s Series 40, will help us achieve this.”
Nokia also noted that the company plans to make a “new service offering” based on Novarra technology available later this year.
Privately held Novarra offers the Vision Browser, which supports Flash and video, DHTML, and full HTML with JavaScript and AJAX, RSS and widgets. Other features include a “fit-to-screen” layout, zoom, single click access to search and login forms, and a password manager.
To its credit, Nokia has been moving aggressively to regain some sparkle and find the edge it once had among mobile phones. Nokia is engaged in a back and forth legal struggle with Apple over patent infringement allegations–Nokia claims Apple is violating its patents, and Apple accuses Nokia of the same. Nokia also formed an alliance with Intel to combine their Linux-based mobile operating systems to create MeeGo.
Novarra also offers a transformation server that the company claims can promote the speed of delivering video to smartphones. The technology does this by detecting video created for the PC, such as Flash, MPEG4 and WMV, and adapting it to a smartphone. In most cases, the video is streamed as 3GPP over RSTP to run within Novarra’s browser. In other cases, the Novarra technology can invoke a third-party player or application.
Novarra, based in Chicago has more than 100 employees, Nokia hopes to finalize the deal in the second quarter and launch later in the year in a new mobile browser and services application that will be contained in its portfolio, enabling it to offer an improved Internet experience to users of a Nokia mobile device.
Early this month, Nokia introduced the C5, a simplified smartphone that lacks a touchscreen or a QWERTY keyboard. The device is the latest in Nokia’s C-series, which uses the Symbian operating system and features a 2.2-inch screen, a 2-GB memory card, an FM radio and a 3.2 megapixel camera.
Novarra currently works with Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, LG, and other mobile phone manufacturers–providing Nokia with an established client portfolio for its new mobile Web browser.