Spanish telecommunications company Telefónica announced to have acquired cloud computing start-up eyeOS, which introduced an open source web desktop solution called eyeOS. The two companies have worked together for the last four years and have signed an agreement back on September 2013 to enhance VDI distribution through HTML5.
The objective of the telecommunication company with this acquisition is to strengthen its offering in future mobile cloud services and encourage the development of open source technology solutions. Telefonica is aiming to take a position among the open source desktop virtualization services (DVS), and together with eyeOS technology they are going to apply desktop virtualization to mobile devices, such as tablets, mobile phones, as well as desktops, leaving all processing of data in the cloud. Using HTML5 and open source technologies eyeOS and Telefonica are going to open the market to all kind of devices, no matter what system they are using, therefore the ability to be able to access any application.
Headquartered in Barcelona and founded 2006, eyeOS will be part of Telefónica and will continue to work as an autonomous subsidiary, as stated in the press release the co-founder of the company Pau Garcia-Milà will stay in the innovative processes of the company, but for the moment he will not have a formal role within Telefónica. Garcia-Milà also declared:
The acquisition of eyeOS demonstrates the willingness of a large company like Telefónica to work with start-ups, highlighting its openness to innovation and its ability to seek talent and the best ideas outside of its own structure. Telefónica will help eyeOS to not only consolidate and expand its technological proposal, but give it international reach through Telefónica’s global network.