UIQ files for bankruptcy

Swedish smartphone user interface vendor UIQ has filed for bankruptcy, according to media reports.
Indeed, the move was foreshadowed in June when UIQ announced it would layoff 200 of its 375 employees and seek new lines of business. However, it seems the company’s efforts did not pan out.
“There are no opportunities to create a new line of business in the current financial climate,” UIQ Chief Executive Johan Sandberg told Reuters today.
The future of UIQ has been cloudy for more than a year now.
Sony Ericsson bought UIQ from Symbian Ltd. in February, 2007. Motorola then bought 50% of UIQ from Sony Ericsson in October, 2007. UIQ’s underlying platform is the Symbian OS, which both Sony Ericsson and Motorola used at the time.
Nokia Corp. then shook up the market with its $411 million purchase of Symbian in June, 2008, with the promise of making the platform free to handset makers.
Motorola subsequently said it would drop Symbian’s UIQ platform and an internally developed Linux platform, with an eye toward refreshing its phone fortunes and using Google Inc.’s Android platform. Meanwhile, Sony Ericsson has been experimenting with other operating systems, such as Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Mobile offering.