The LiMo Foundation, a grouping of mobile companies including Motorola, Samsung, NTT DoCoMo and Orange, has scored a success with another wave of handsets using the LiMo platform.

There are now more than 20 handsets supporting the LiMo standard OS.

This comes just weeks after Nokia’s much-publicised decision to move the Symbian operating system to an open platform.

The other open-source alternative is Google’s Android mobile platform which has its backers in the handset market.

It looks certain that Linux-based open-source platforms will put significant competitive pressure on the proprietary mobile operating systems of Microsoft, RIM and Apple.

Two of the top three mobile phone companies formed the LiMo Foundation to promote the standard Linux platform in January. It now has over 50 members including operators, software firms and semiconductor suppliers as well as handset manufacturers.

Read the thoughts of John Bruggeman, chief marketing officer at LiMo member Wind River, the real-time operating system and development software company.