The Symbian Foundation is now previewing Symbian Horizon, an application-publishing program scheduled for general availability in October 2009. With it, developers will receive assistance in building applications for Symbian devices and in placing those devices in the global stores that reach customers. Developers also will get promotional assistance for bringing those applications to end users. Symbian Horizon is designed to reduce barriers to success while increasing the profitability of creating and delivering Symbian applications, according to the Symbian Foundation.

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Once Symbian Horizon is generally available, companies and developers will gain access to a variety of services that support the development, distribution, and marketing of mobile applications, the foundation says. From application certification and in-store presence to language translation services and marketing programs, Symbian Horizon works with developers to create a single point of management and distribution to the largest group of mobile consumers worldwide.

According to a recent Gartner report, the Symbian operating system (OS) is installed in more than 70 different types of handsets across 26 countries. Also, Symbian accounted for 49.3% of the worldwide smart-phone market share in the first quarter of 2009, though it dipped from its 56.9% market share in the first quarter of 2008 as RIM’s smart-phone OS and Apple’s iPhone OS saw some growing success. Yet Symbian is the only platform that supports a comprehensive runtime suite including Java ME, Adobe Flash Lite, native Symbian C++ and OpenC/C++, Python, and a full Web toolkit, the foundation says.

Symbian Horizon is designed to provide new benefits to two primary communities. The first is made up of application store providers, either operator or manufacturer-based, such as Ovi Store by Nokia, Samsung Applications Store, and AT&T’s Media Mall. The second target community comprises developers ranging from individual developers to companies that want to reach a broader mobile consumer market. Companies already committed to participate in Symbian Horizon include Dynatech, the Guardian, MobileIron, National Public Radio (NPR), Skout, Ustream, and Wine.com.

Symbian Foundation