Norway / China : Trolltech announced that Qtopia Phone Edition ( see left for example ) , the company’s application platform and user interface for Linux-based mobile phones, has been selected by Chinese mobile phone manufacturer ZTE as the Linux-based application framework for ZTE U980.

The U980 is ZTE’s mobile phone platform created for China’s national 3G standard TD-SCDMA. Smartphones based on this platform will be supplied through China Mobile and sold into the market.

ZTE is the biggest infrastructure supplier in China’s TD-SCDMA 3G market. To facilitate 3G smartphone development ZTE created the U980 platform to be one of the smartphone solutions used to create 3G phones. ZTE has long experience with Qtopia Phone Edition and Linux, having already released two Qtopia smartphones (the e3 and e700) in the Chinese market.

“Qtopia offers the advantage of a comprehensive development platform while being very flexible,” said Luo Zhong Sheng, Ph. D, General Manager, TD-SCDMA Product Line, Handsets Division of ZTE. “We hope to leverage both advantages when building our internal TD-SCDMA mobile phone platform, U980. It will enable us to create new and complex devices quickly and efficiently while supporting the Chinese 3G standard.”

“This additional relationship with ZTE affirms their confidence in Qtopia as a fundamental element of their smartphone platform,” said Haavard Nord, Trolltech CEO. “We are honored to be part of the deployment of TD-SCDMA in China through this new cooperation with ZTE. We believe that this partnership is the result of our early commitment to TD-SCDMA technology and to China.”

Trolltech’s award-winning Qtopia® is unrivaled as the application platform for efficient creation of virtually any type of Linux-based device. Qtopia’s comprehensive product family offers an unmatched flexibility and control for customizing the user experience.

Qtopia Phone Edition extends the flexibility and cost-savings benefits of Linux to the mobile market, serving as an alternative to proprietary software platforms, such as Windows Mobile and Symbian.