Telstra undecided on Firefox OS

Telstra was mentioned as one of the key telecommunications companies looking to sell devices with the Mozilla Firefox OS announced at Mobile World Congress (MWC) overnight, but the company isn't completely on board yet.

Devices using Firefox OS are not due out until the middle of the year, but 17 operators have already signed on to the "open web device initiative".

In Mozilla's announcement, it said that "Telstra is welcoming the Mozilla initiative as an opportunity to deliver an innovative mobile web experience to their customers".

But the company couldn't confirm to ZDNet whether it would stock Firefox OS devices.

"At this stage, we're yet to decide whether we will offer Firefox OS mobiles. We'll be evaluating phones running the OS in the coming months," Telstra said in a statement. "One of the potential advantages of Firefox OS is that it could help bring smartphone features to lower-cost devices."

Optus' parent company SingTel is on board with Firefox OS with former Optus CEO and now SingTel consumer group CEO Paul O'Sullivan saying that the company is "excited about the capabilities that can arise from an open mobile ecosystem using HTML5". Optus did not have any information about local releases for Firefox OS devices when asked by ZDNet.

Part owner of Vodafone Australia, Hutchison, has indicated that it is keen for Firefox OS, but local Vodafone representatives had not confirmed whether the company would stock Firefox OS mobile devices.