Intel: No MeeGo handsets or tablets until 2011

Not only has Ari Jaaksi, Nokia's Vice President of Devices for MeeGo, recently departed, but an Intel executive has admitted that MeeGo-powered smartphones and tablets won't debut until next year, according to Forbes. The double-blow comes eight months after Intel and Nokia joined forces to push out portable MeeGo gadgets.

MeeGo phones and tablets will thus be available in 2011, with handsets arriving in the first half of 2011, and tablets sometime later in the year (with the already released WeTab-formerly-named-WePad being the only exception). Featuring support for touch-based commands and telephony, version 1.1 of the operating system will be unveiled later this month.

Other MeeGo devices will still ship this year, including netbooks, Internet-connected TVs (IPTVs), and entertainment systems. Eventually, Intel wants to see MeeGo incorporated in embedded devices such as digital signs, kiosks, and ATMs.

Nokia is betting big on MeeGo, seeing as its N8 smartphone will be the last one to run on Symbian. Intel, meanwhile, is hoping MeeGo will get manufacturers to use its Atom processor. To that end, the chipmaker has been populating the Intel AppUp store with over 1,000 MeeGo applications.