” NyTeknik, a weekly Swedish technology newspaper, is reporting that Jan Uddenfeldt, Sony Ericsson’s new CTO, said that the company “have no plans for new products with Symbian”. While this is not a definitive statement, it would appear to rule out any Symbian^3 handsets from Sony Ericsson and leave longer term plans uncertain. It follows on from the recent news that Samsung also has no current plans for Symbian handsets.
The news, if confirmed, will come as a blow to the Symbian Foundation and, to a lesser extent, Nokia. For the short term it will leave Nokia, Fujitsu and Sharp as the only companies known to be working on future Symbian handsets. Sony Ericsson (as Ericsson) was one of the founding members of Symbian and has a long history with the platform, from UIQ up to the more recent Symbian^1 Vivaz handsets.
At this stage it is not possible to rule out future Symbian devices from Sony Ericsson altogether. Unlike Samsung, Sony Ericsson remains actively engaged with the Symbian Foundation. For example, its representatives were present at three of the four council meetings in September (Release Council, UI Council and Feature and Roadmap Council). This would suggest a continuing interest in the platform. A likely scenario is that Sony Ericsson is keeping its options open and may release a Symbian^4, or later, device.” Read more here:
