The boring version goes something like this: “Ericsson has completed the divestment of its 50 per cent stake in Sony Ericsson, including the broad IP cross-licensing agreement, jointly announced by Sony Corporation and Ericsson on October 27, 2011. This makes Sony Ericsson a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony.”

Yawn! But what this really means is the end of Sony Ericsson phones as we know them. Ericsson was early on the mobile bandwagon (along with Motorola and Nokia) and pioneered the “Mars bar” handset style. Pairing up with Sony in 2001, the joint venture went on to make a series of classic handsets that brought Sony’s music (Walkman) and photography (Cyber-shot) expertise to the phone excellence party.

Some of our golden age favourites were 2005’s Sony Ericsson W800i (pictured above) – which offered a staggering 30 hours of music playback – and the 5MP K850i. The partnership also spawned the world’s first 8MP camphone (Sony Ericsson C905) and the world’s first 12MP camera smartphone (2009’s Sony Ericsson Satio).

More recent glories include Sony Ericsson’s portfolio of Android smartphones, such as the Xperia Arc S, and we’ll be reviewing the future of Sony phones right here very soon. Much as we’re sad to see Sony and Ericsson go their separate ways, we’re excited to see what’s written in Sony’s mobile future.