The era of the PC platform left a legacy of competitive strategies for
the future technologies to follow. However, this notion became more
complicated, once the future grew out to be a present with huge bundle
of innovative technologies, Internet capabilities, communication
possibilities, and ease in life. A major step of moving from a product
phone to a smart phone, eventually to a mobile device has created a new
industry with humongous potential for further developments. The current
mobile platform market is witnessing a platforms-war with big players
such as Apple, Google, Nokia and Microsoft in a major role. An important
aspect of today’s mobile platform market is the contributions made
through open source initiatives which promote innovation. This paper
gives an insight into the open-source software strategies of the leading
players and its implications on the market. It first gives a precise
overview of the past leading to the current mobile platform market share
state. Then it briefs about the open-source software components used
and released by Apple, Google and Nokia platforms, leading to their
mobile platform strategies with regard to open source. Finally, the
paper assesses the situation from the point of view of communities of
software developers complementing each platform. The authors identified
relevant implications of the open-source phenomenon in the
mobile-industry.