Microsoft has taken a minority stake in Sendo, a Birmingham mobile phone maker, as the American software giant tries to break into the market for mobile phone operating systems.
Microsoft paid more than £7m for a stake of less than 10% in Sendo, a privately-held company and has an option to increase its stake to 20% in a company that makes handsets to mobile phone operators' specifications.
"Sendo has chosen to develop these devices together with the world's largest software company, whose software is used in the vast majority of personal computers," Hugh Brogan, chief executive officer of Sendo, said. "There are more than six million application developers for Microsoft's operating systems. There is no other company that offers this competitive edge and that allows us to enter the market quickly."
MicrosoftÕs move steps up its presence in the market for mobile phone operating and marks the first time that it has invested in a handset manufacturer. Most leading handset makers, including Nokia and Motorola, are partners in Symbian, a London-based consortium led by Psion. It is also developing an operating system for mobile phones that competes with Microsoft's Stinger operating system.
Microsoft has teamed up with smaller phone manufacturers, such as Sendo of Birmingham, Korea's Samsung Electronics and Mitsubishi of Japan and is trying to help them gain market share at the expense of Symbian's licensees.
The investment cements an existing relationship between the two companies. Sendo, which was founded in 1999, has already unveiled a colour-screen phone running the Stinger operating system; the Sendo Z100 Multimedia Smartphone handset is due to be launched at the end of the year.
Sendo is currently shipping phones to three operators: Virgin Group's Virgin Mobile unit; Telfort, the Dutch subsidiary of BT and Telecel Vodafone in Portugal, which is majority owned by Vodafone Group of the U.K.
Before the Microsoft investment, a total of 37% of Sendo shares were owned by CCT Telecom Holdings, a Hong Kong maker of cordless phones, and Bowman Capital Management of San Mateo, California. Sendo executives own the rest.
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