Hold the Phone Mabel!!

For those in the Open Source movement this might be a very significant event. Nokia is buying TrollTech for ~$150m. Aaaaah, who is TrollTech? If you are a Linux user and use KDE as your desktop GUI then you are using a QT library licensed by TrollTech. –

Nokia is to buy Trolltech, the company whose Linux-based Qt application-development framework is at the core of many PC and mobile applications.

On Monday the companies announced that Nokia was offering 16 Norwegian Kroner per Trolltech share in cash, making the total value of the deal around NOK844m (£78m). The deal has been unanimously approved by Trolltech’s board of directors, and holders representing around two-thirds of Trolltech’s shares and votes have also accepted the offer in advance.

Qt forms the basis of many well-known desktop applications, such as Google Earth, Opera and Skype. Qt is used to develop graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and is the main GUI toolkit for the KDE Linux project, one of the two main desktop environments for the open-source operating system — the other being Gnome. Qt’s derivative, Qtopia — also a Trolltech product — is already used in millions of consumer-level mobile phones, notably in Asia and through the manufacturer Motorola.

Dr Kai Öistämö, the head of Nokia’s devices unit, said in a press conference on Monday that the Finnish manufacturer would allow Trolltech to “continue in its current organisation form with full operational alignment” after the deal closes — a development expected to occur in the second quarter of this year. Nokia already uses Qt in its Nokia PC Suite application to allow mobile handsets to integrate with Windows PCs.

Probably half the OS distros use KDE as a desktop GUI. TrollTech has traditionally not charged $$ for use of the Qt libraries if it is intended for non commercial use. With the buyout the licensing could change. The question is why would a cell phone maker want with TrollTech? the Qt/KDE environment is not lightweight so not very suitable for cell devices. Something else is driving this.

Linky.