The homescreen-level interaction, Jolla suggests, means Sailfish will be the most streamlined and speedy OS for users to navigate through. For instance, they’ll be able to pause a song or end an ongoing call without having to open the respective apps themselves: you can swipe a finger across the music player app thumbnail to the left to pause playback, or to the right to skip to the next track.

Sailfish also has a so-called “Pulley Menu” for “fast and effortless interaction” and the open-source SDK is already being fleshed out. It consists of components including Qt, the Mer Core, and the Linux kernel, and can turn its hand to duties on smartphones, tablet, smart TVs, in-car systems, and other applications. Jolla will have a copy of the version shown off today “very soon.”

According to Jolla, many Android apps will run on Jolla devices with no modifications. However, there’ll need to be tweaks made if best use of Sailfish is desired “If you want to take advantage of all UI and other features of Sailfish OS and make yourapplications fast,” the Sailfish SDK wiki explains, ”you can port your applications to native QT/QML.” That’s the full version of Qt, too, along with HTML5, though there won’t be DRM support.

Jolla also has its first carrier onboard, with DNA set to get the first Sailfish-based devices and be part of what the company says will be “a network of partners” around the OS “during the coming year.”

Jolla isn’t content with just one chipset partner, however. “ST-Ericsson’s NovaThor platform combined with Sailfish OS will enable vendors to bring highly competitive mobile products to the market. We welcome other players in the mobile industry to join and contribute to this game changing movement” Jolla CEO Marc Dillon said today. “We also target to announce other chipset provider partnerships soon.”

Update: MTV3 has a hands-on video demo of Sailfish here. [Thanks Kote!]

It’s not the first time we’ve seen HTC dabble in its own chips. The company debuted the HTC Image Chip in the new One Series of smartphones, an uninspiring name for a processor that significantly boosts the photography skills of devices like the One X and One S.

However, an application processor like HTC will apparently be producing with ST-Ericsson is another level of complexity up from a companion chip. The two firms have supposedly signed a “memorandum of understanding,” though full details on the deal are unknown.

The first chips are expected to show up in production quantities in 2013, and though neither HTC nor ST-Ericsson have said, we’re guessing both Android and Windows Phone devices will be aiming to use them. Currently, Nokia has the entry-level Windows Phone market mostly to itself, though ZTE is showing increasing interest in that segment, and HTC could well look to rebuild its fortunes with a play of its own.

[via Unwired View; image via iFixit]

There is no indication that the NovaThor will be exclusive, Nokia will likely use both Qualcomm and ST-Ericsson chips in their devices. Presumably, the ST-Ericsson chips will be used in the cheaper Windows phone devices from Nokia. The NovaThor range has three dual core parts with the U9500, U8500, and the U5500.

The U9500 and U8500 parts both support 1080p video recording and 20MP still photos. The U9500 will also support dual 1280 x 768 screens at once and 3D graphics. The U9500 also has support for TV standards as an option. It uses an ARM Cortex-A9 processor, LP-DDR2 interface, and ARM Mali 400 GPU with Neon CPU extensions.

[via MyNokiaBlog]

“Qualcomm has a long history of working closely with Microsoft and we continue to support the launches of new Windows Phones based on our Snapdragon processors.  We are excited about this next Windows Phone Mango release that will leverage the synergy of our highly integrated second generation Snapdragon solution and Microsoft’s Windows Phone software,” said Steve Mollenkopf, executive vice president and group president of Qualcomm” Steve Mollenkopf, executive vice president and group president of Qualcomm

The news means that rumors of an ST-Ericsson assault on the Windows Phone handset market looks unlikely, leaving comments from the company’s CEO that the chips would be found in some Nokia Windows Phone devices looking unclear. Nokia has confirmed that its first Windows Phones will run Mango but made no indication as to what processors it would be slotting inside; “rather than simply create one high-end device,” the company stated, “Nokia plans to develop and release a portfolio of products that address as many of our audiences and markets as possible.”

That implies a range of low- to high-price SoCs to suit. Until now, Microsoft’s strict minimum standards had left all the first-gen Windows Phone handsets broadly the same under the hood, though with talk of looser reins second time around we’re expecting Qualcomm to push its newer dual-core chips such as in the HTC Sensation.

First SoC to make an appearance is the ST-Ericsson U8500, last seen running MeeGo as a test platform back in January, prior to Nokia’s Windows Phone announcement. The dual-core U8500 will be followed by various upgraded chipsets as ST-Ericsson keeps pace with the twelve Nokia WP8 devices the company will apparently be releasing in 2012.

The announcement comes as little surprise. ST-Ericsson – of which STMicroelectronics is half, and Ericsson the other – said back in February that it was focusing heavily on the Windows Phone platform, and Bozotti says the partnership is investing $1bn in R&D for things such as 4G/LTE radios. The addition of the supplier to the Microsoft platform will also assist Nokia in pushing out the “cheap” Windows Phone handsets the company has promised.

In development since 1976, and with the first satellites installed in October 1982, Glonass was completed in 1995 but subsequently fell into disrepair. Since then, the Russian space agency has shunted a huge amount of its budget – one-third in 2010 – to restoring Glonass, with full global coverage expected to be achieved later this year.

Accordingly, the Russian government now apparently mandates that devices on sale in the country must also support Glonass if they offer GPS functionality. Whether handsets and gadgets on sale outside of Russia will do the same remains to be seen, though the upside for the consumer would be faster fix times and boosted performance in urban canyons.

[via GigaOm; image via Wikipedia]

ST-Ericsson, is a joint venture between Sweden’s Ericsson (ERICb.ST) and STMicroelectronics (STM.PA) of France and is a key supplier to Nokia, among other major phone makers. There were previous leaks that Nokia was using ST-Ericsson hardware for MeeGo. We will just have to wait and see where Nokia decides to go when they are ready to start producing WP7 phones.

[via Reuters]

As for which manufacturers might climb on board, according to iSuppli both Texas Instruments and ST-Ericsson are looking at ways to integrated wireless charging into their printed circuit boards, while Logitech and Case-Mate are tipped as potential accessory partners.  Nokia and RIM, meanwhile, are believed to be looking at producing wireless charging compatible handsets.

ST-Ericsson and ARM have announced that they have teamed to enable support for the Android OS on multiple core ARM Cortex-A9 processors. ST-Ericsson’s high-performance U8500 platform features the Coretex-A9 dual core CPU.

Support for SMP within Android will allow Android devices to step up to a new level of performance and capabilities for rich web content and multimedia. The optimized platform from AT-Ericsson will feature the Cortex-A9 and a Mali-400 GPU offering support for up to 120 hours of audio playback and 12 hours of 1080p video playback on a single charge. No time frame was offered for the debut of devices using the U8500 platform and Android.

Video demo after the cut

In fact, the U8500 is powerful enough to support dual displays simultaneously, up to XGA resolution touchscreens, and dual cameras with integrated ISP for 18-megapixel and 5-megapixel optics.  There’s also WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS, together with integrated USB 2.0 and HDMI output, and mobile TV support is an option.  Obviously there’s also HSPA connectivity.

ST-Ericsson have already added Android support to the U8500, though right now there are still a few bugs in the implementation.  It’ll also play nicely with Symbian and other Linux-based OSes; ST-Ericsson are already members of both the Symbian Foundation and the OHA.  We’re not sure when we might see the first U8500-based devices, but going by the smoothness of the demo video below, we’re already excited.

Press Release:

ST-ERICSSON AND ARM IN COOPERATION TO ACCELERATE INNOVATION IN MOBILE USER EXPERIENCE

ST-Ericsson’s U8500 platform first to integrate Mali-400TM graphics processing unit providing access to a leading-edge environment for graphics developers

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND AND CAMBRIDGE UK – Oct. 21, 2009, ST-Ericsson, a world leader in wireless platforms and semiconductors and ARM [(LSE: ARM); (Nasdaq: ARMH)], announce a cooperation to accelerate the next step in mobile user experience and graphics innovation with the creation of a Mali technology-enabled development platform for content and application developers available via the ARM MaliTM Developer Center. The cooperation will speed up bringing consumers a better gaming experience in terms of high quality graphics, video and audio on their mobile devices. At the same time it will improve the user interface with enhanced performance, quicker responses and the ability to implement 3D graphics. The availability of the platform will enable developers to reduce significantly the time-to-market of content and applications for next generation devices.

The ARM Mali Developer Center (www.malideveloper.com) fosters a growing developer community of software engineers by providing resources such as graphics software development tools, example code, documentation and access to upcoming hardware through a community-based web portal.

“ARM has welcomed the opportunity to launch this joint initiative with ST-Ericsson. The availability of this development platform will help achieve and accelerate the Mali vision of outstanding graphics in any consumer electronic device,” said Lance Howarth, general manager, ARM Media Processing Division “By using the platform, members of the Mali Developer Center will be able to access Mali GPU capabilities early and create outstanding content and applications for the next generation of consumer devices.”

“Advanced graphics play a key role in the user experience for a wide variety of portable and consumer devices. Our collaboration with ARM will bring the Mali GPU capabilities to the developer community,” said Marc Cetto, vice president, 3G Multimedia and Platforms Division, ST-Ericsson. “With this co-operation we foresee that our customers will benefit from the early availability of a broad range of innovative content for their devices.”

To provide access to a leading edge environment, the development board is powered by ST-Ericsson’s U8500, the first smartphone platform to integrate the ARM Mali-400 OpenGL ES2.0 and OpenVG1.1 graphics processing unit. The U8500 is one of the earliest mobile platforms to introduce an ARM Cortex™-A9 MPCore™ SMP dual core processor and can support HD video playback at 1080p.

[via GenerationMP3 and via B4Tech]