Handmark to acquire Astraware

[Bob Russell]

Handmark and Astraware have already been selling software on each other's web sites, and have done joint development. So it's not too much of a surprise that they have joined forces. It will surely bring some significant rewards for all the years of hard work.

What you may not know, however, is that Astraware has quite a history including development for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, PCs. From 1998 forward, the focus became PalmOS and Pocket PC.

Currently they are famous for games like Bejeweled, which has often been distributed with Palm devices, and is addictive fun for everyone I know that has tried it. They are one of the companies that have personally won my heart through every aspect of game quality and corporate communications. Howard Tomlinson, the CEO of Astraware was one of the original developers, and has been available to the mobile blog community. They celebrate International Talk Like a Pirate Day, and they even have a nice corporate team blog. How can you not like this company?!

Handmark will certainly gain a lot of visibility among PalmOS and Windows Mobile fans with this move. To this point in time, many people probably view them as the company that has Monopoly and Scrabble. I look forward to seeing how the future unfolds, and I think all of us are thankful for the companies who remain faithful to the PalmOS and Windows Mobile platforms in the midst of all the handheld OS turmoil.