The deal will eventually see Qualcomm stopping commercial sales of the Eudora client, but not before it adopts the same technology platform as the Mozilla Thunderbird client and is released under an open source license.
The open source version is targeted for release in the first half of 2007, while Qualcomm has also promised to participate in Mozilla development communities to enhance both Eudora and Thunderbird.
In the interim, Qualcomm said it would continue to sell and support the Eudora client, at a reduced rate of just under $20 for six months technical support, a 60% discount, while it also assured users it would honor existing support agreements.
In announcing the move, Qualcomm admitted that the email market is not in alignment with the core business or strategic goals of the company, which specializes in CDMA wireless chipsets and associated technologies.
That much was obvious, but Qualcomm’s involvement with Eudora dates back to 1991 when it purchased the rights for external use and employed its creator Steve Dorner, who had created it as a freeware project in 1998 while at the University of Illinois.
