With its open source and proprietary rivals proliferating and shoring up their positions, the Linux-based LiMo Foundation is pulling out all the stops in its bid to establish itself as the preeminent mobile platform.

LiMo, an alliance of major handset vendors and carriers developing a Linux-based smartphone operating system, this week revealed a number of new handsets boasting sought-after features. Yesterday at the LinuxWorld conference, its members unveiled the Motorola EM 30.

The new device, sporting GPS, advanced music features and other enhancements, joined seven additional handsets announced on Monday -- including Motorola's Motozine zN5, four NEC handsets and two Panasonic Mobile Communications devices. The new handsets, which also tout improved display resolution and video streaming, are built on LiMo's 2.0 Linux mobile platform, set to be published later this year and completed in early 2009.

With the number of LiMo devices standing at 22, and now including models with capabilities like GPS navigation, mobile television and high-speed 3G connectivity, the group said it's pushing hard into the marketplace. "The [device] announcements this week show that LiMo is a very real and tangible platform that's being embraced aggressively," Andrew Shikiar, LiMo's director of global marketing, told InternetNews.com.

Click here for the rest of this article at internetnews.com.