Sony Ericsson & Motorola started 2008 with a selection of existing and leaked UIQ handsets which appeared to presage a revitalised UIQ interface.
Today, both giants of the industry have pulled from UIQ and appear to have embraced Microsoft Mobile for their Touch strategy, not withstanding SE's vague announcements concerning Symbian's Series 60 V5 UI.
Downsizing their Symbian Smartphone booth from Samsung size last year to a start-up size this year, shows the dramatic drop from favour that UIQ has received from the market. Yet is this a good idea?
SE's Paris (P5) handset seemed to have addressed the hardware issues from the P990i/P1i and Motorola's Z10 would be a better alternative to the Microsoft's Mobile Standard.
Yet both companies have given up the UIQ challenge and gone for the less usable, though feature rich, Microsoft solutions.
The natural replacement for SE's P range is consequently the just released Xperia X1.
This has serious usability limitations which will never be addressed until Mobile 7 is released late 2009 or early 2010.
Perhaps a Windows Mobile 6.5 may help, but it seems that the consumer touch game is, for the next year, between Nokia, Apple and Google.
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