Panasonic has announced it's pulling out of the GSM mobile market - but only to concentrate on 3G and 4G phones.  In addition, the company has announced it's ditching Symbian in favour of Linux as its platform of choice for its future phones.

 

Looking ahead to the future,  Yoshiaki Kushiki, president of Panasonic Mobile, said "The restructuring is not business contraction, but aims to prepare for rolling back in the next transition from 3G to 4G that will come around in 2008 to 2010." The company expects, therefore, to be in the mobile phone business for some time to come.  Future products include 3G phones with DTV tuners built-in, arriving as early as spring 2006.