Sun takes a shine to Vodafone live!

Sun is working with Vodafone on a new development platform for the mobile operator's Vodafone live! multimedia services.

Called VFX, the platform is built on Java Technology for the Wireless Industry specifications, with the aim of providing billable applications more easily. It also uses the Java Device Test Suite for testing applications.

Juan Dewar, senior director of product marketing at Sun, told vnunet.com: "We are not trying to invent a new stock. It's the way we approach these engineering challenges. If there's innovation and we can generate APIs we do that."

Vodafone marketing director Guy Laurence said in a statement: "We selected Java as our core platform and Sun as the prime vendor to help us build and execute our strategy."

The move reflects the increasing popularity of Java as a development language and runtime environment among handset vendors and carriers.

Sun estimates there are now 350 million Java-enabled handsets, and 90 carrier deployments worldwide.