Motorola purchases J2ME provisioning company

Motorola announced its acquisition of 4thpass, a Seattle-based company that has developed a Java download server that allows provisioning of Java applications.

Motorola said it would incorporate 4thpass’ Mobile Application System (MAS) into its J2ME product portfolio. MAS provides a smart provisioning system that gives carriers more ways to bill for content and advanced technology, validate applications and control how applications behave on devices and networks.

“We think it affords operators a very open standards-based approach for delivering applications quickly,” said Dennis Burke, director of strategy with Motorola’s personal communications services group. “As we looked around and talked to operators about the best way to meet their needs for a complete end-to-end solution, we felt this acquisition was to best way to offer this solution quickly and mitigate the risk for carriers is for Motorola to own or control a significant part of that solution.”

Telefonica Moviles in Spain, Nextel Communications and Korea’s LG Telecom are among the operators that have deployed the technology. Additionally MAS is resold through network vendors as Ericsson and Siemens.

“We’ll continue to resell the technology,” Burke said. “Our intent is to treat 4thpass at arms length so it can continue working as a startup and keep the reseller relationships intact … One of the things we don’t wan to do is further fragment the end-to-end solutions space.”

The transaction price was not disclosed, but Motorola expects the sale to close this month. Motorola Ventures was a strategic investor in the company. Other 4thpass investors include Investcorp, QVP Venture Partners and Nextel.