Skyfire buys Google Android browser maker
Summary
Skyfire is a free mobile browser that uses cloud-based processing to deliver a full web experience, including Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight content. Steel is a free browser based on the Webkit architecture that is designed to provide a more user friendly interface for browsing on Android devices. That operating system has been gaining ground on the competition, including Windows Mobile and Symbian, with recent high-profile introductions such as the Motorola Droid and Google Nexus One. First introduced in late 2008, Android had already captured 4.7 percent of worldwide smartphone shipments in 2009, according to recent estimates by research firm Canalys. In addition to fast delivery of web pages with multimedia, Skyfire includes tools for simultaneously conducting searches on multiple search engines and for posting content to multiple social-networking services, including Facebook and Twitter.