Nokia jumps out of thin air, acquires bit-side
Can't say we saw this one coming. Out of seemingly nowhere, Nokia has up and acquired a privately held Berlin-based professional services and software company with 39 employees. As part of the agreement, Nokia will take on "substantially all assets of bit-side GmbH," and for some unexplained reason, that move will enable Nokia to "strengthen and accelerate its mobile development for Nokia Maps." According to Michael Halbherr, vice president and head of social location at Nokia: "Acquiring bit-side enables Nokia to offer consumers the world-leading mobile location applications, such as Maps, along with routing and navigation at an accelerated speed." It's stated that bit-side will be wrapped into Nokia's Services unit, but honestly, we're still left mostly in the dark as to what this all means. Dark and inscrutable, just how we like it.
[Via MobilityUpdate]
