The annual Symbian show kicks-off in just under two weeks. This year’s event promises to be busier than ever, with more demands on the time of attendees. To help you figure out your priorities, I will be highlighting a few key exhibitors and speakers over the next few days. Today, Accenture.

Back in July, Accenture announced its intention to purchase the Symbian Professional Services group from Nokia. The deal is part of a continuing thrust by Accenture to become a leading supplier of embedded software services and technologies to mobile phone and smartphone manufacturers.

This is reflected in Accenture's sponsorship of SEE. In addition to its sponsorship presence at the show, Abhijit Kabra, Global Lead, Product Software, Accenture, will be giving a talk titled Unleashing the Power of 4G and Open Development to Accelerate Growth in the Smartphone Industry.  

Some of the key items Abhijit will touch on during his presentation are:

• 4G will transform the way we live and work by shifting computing power from desks and laps to hands
• Devices will become extremely powerful: higher horse power, better battery life, higher data speeds, always connected
• Content, applications, and services will evolve into a framework where they will learn user needs and personalise accordingly
• Homes will become more intelligent by connecting devices into a home network where data can flow seamlessly between them, with the control handled via the mobile phone
• Companies will need to expand their portfolio far beyond their current capabilities.

 These aspects of the future personal information space will require companies to: 

• Maintain a razor sharp focus on user needs
• Aggressively create collaborations and alliances with companies to deliver complementary capabilities
• Maximize operational efficiencies by leveraging the right processes, tools, and infrastructure
• Reduce and manage costs in a complex business environment.

Key aspects of Accenture’s offering Abhijit will be introducing are new and transformational ways to test mobile handsets, based on Symbian and several other operating systems, that cut overall product testing costs by 30-50 percent. You can read more about this now by downloading the Accenture report Transforming Mobile Handset Testing.

One of the anticipated effects of open-sourcing Symbian is that the number of companies building devices based on the OS will grow. Accenture is positioning itself to service these companies with the core services needed to get devices and their associated services to market quickly and cost effectively.

Abhijit Kabra will be making his presentation at 3pm on Tuesday, 27 October as part of the Device Creation and Contributing to Symbian track.

To talk to someone from Accenture at SEE 2009, please contact Charlie Hartley at charles.hartley@accenture.com  (+1 908 285 3540) or visit VIP Suite V1 at the show.