Adobe has admitted its Flash Player 10.1 for mobile platforms has slipped from its intended release and will now not hit handsets until the second half of 2010.

Version 10.1 had originally been designed for both Android and webOS, although Adobe had since committed to supporting BlackBerry OS, Symbian and Windows Phone 7.

Adobe had expected it to launch in the first half of this year, its initial release of late 2009 having already slipped by.

Flash go slow

This latest delay comes as the firm, which is yet to release an official version of Flash for mobile, battles against increasing competition from HTML5 and Microsoft's Silverlight in the mobile space – the latter expected to be behind the bulk of Windows Phone 7 app development.

While the likes of Google and Microsoft are supporting Flash – commentators speculating this gives both firms ammunition against rival Apple and the continuing lack of Flash on iPhone – many wonder if their collective backing will fall away once its competitors come to the fore.

Many devices currently use archaic versions of Flash to provide support, Sony's PSP running Flash 6 which made its debut back in 2002, while Symbian and Windows Mobile run Flash Lite, which is based on the Flash 8 release three years later.

[source: AppleInsider]