With its latest foray into the acquisition market Motorola has added Aloqa to its location-based portfolio for an undisclosed sum.
Aloqa, a German-based company formed in 2007, will become part of Motorola's Motoblur which currently delivers customised content to mobile devices, allowing access to Facebook MySpace and Twitter updates, emails, news and widgets.
Adding Aloqa's location-triggered, mobile push platform will enable users to access publishers of location-aware content in real-time. Before it was acquired, the company recently claimed to have passed the million-user landmark.
The location-based software is available for all major smartphone manufacturers' products. It recognises a customer's identity and matches it with their location and preferences to proactively inform them of nearby events, services and places of interest. It can also offer exclusive deals from over 100 retail outlets and local attractions in six countries to add value for its users.
Motorola announced last July that its mobile business and Motoblur will be spun-off as a separate company in early 2011.
"Aloqa is an exciting addition to Motorola Mobility as its specialised engineering talent and location-tracking technology will significantly accelerate the release of our context-aware mobile services platform," said Christy Wyatt, corporate vice president of software and services product management for Motorola Mobility.
Aloqa'c chief executive Sanjeev Agrawal added: "Like every startup, we have always dreamed of our technology and product being used by tens of millions of satisfied users everywhere. Being a part of the Motorola Mobility team will help us achieve this goal."
Motorola has heavily invested in Android smartphones and the Droid X range, in particular, has turned the company into a hot property. Aloqa supports smartphones from Apple, RIM, Nokia, Sony Ericsson and the Android franchises. Motorola has not yet said whether Aloqa will become Android-only or if its own Mobility spin-off will become a nonpartisan operation supporting all formats.
