Nokia on Thursday continued its offloading of Symbian businesses by selling its messaging service to Synchronica. The mobile messaging developer will get Nokia's self-run e-mail, instant messaging, and social networking portals. It plans to take on all of Nokia's ten contracts in North America and will keep supporting both basic S40 phones and Symbian smartphones.
About 250 staffers will change hands in the deal, which the two sides hope will be approved in the summer.
Synchronica explained the deal as a way of significantly boosting the number of contracts it has. It already has 80 in the rest of the world but has had virtually no presence in North America until the deal with Nokia.
For Nokia, the move is likely another cost-cutting measure to help offset steep market share losses. It also helps slim down the Finnish company's Symbian-related team further as it plans to move on to Windows Phone, where much of Nokia's work won't be necessary. Many of the messaging features that once needed Nokia's help are already built into WP7 Mango and are often found close together, such as Windows Live Messenger, Facebook, and Twitter.
