HELSINKI - THE world's leading mobile phone maker Nokia said Tuesday its acquisition of Symbian, a London-based software group, had been completed.

'All conditions to Nokia's offer to acquire Symbian Limited have been satisfied and it has received valid acceptance of greater than 99.9 per cent of the total Symbian shares that Nokia did not already own,' the mobile phone giant said in a statement.

Everyone working for Symbian, which specialises in open platform software for mobile phones and employs nearly 1,500 people, will transfer to Nokia next February, it added.

The Finnish company announced in June that it would buy out other Symbian shareholders Sony Ericsson, Panasonic, Siemens and Samsung for 264 million euros (S$510 million), or 3.65 euros per share.

Nokia said it would join a number of other industry players, including AT&T, Sony Ericsson and Vodafone, to set up a non-profit Symbian Foundation aimed at creating a single, royalty-free software platform.

The Symbian Foundation is expected to start operating during the first half of 2009. -- AFP