Motorola, Nokia and Sun Microsystems separate paths for the future of cell phone software

Java giants Motorola, Nokia and Sun Microsystems are plowing separate paths for the future of cell phone software. The widening divergence in their commercial Java products--and differences of opinion about how to keep Java open--threatens to fracture the broad community of Java developers. Sun last week announced Java Mobile FX, a high-end software package for cell phones based largely on desktop Java software it recently acquired from Savaje Technologies. Sun also disclosed its plans for making Java open source. Motorola and Nokia executives said news of the Sun mobile software took them by surprise. They also expressed concerns about some of the details of Sun's open-source plans. The two companies are basing their Java road maps on software drawn from separate pools of open-source software.