Today’s mobile news roundup features a few interesting developments: Google acquires Quickoffice, Virgin Mobile has a prepaid iPhone, Nokia updates its feature phone line, and an emergency phone that runs on a single AA battery.

Google acquires Quickoffice

Google and Quickoffice, a small software company that makes the Quickoffice Pro productivity suite that serves as a business editing tool for Android, announced the acquisition on their blog sites.

Alan Warren, Engineering Director of Google, happily announced their acquisition stating that, “Quickoffice has a strong base of users, and we look forward to supporting them while we work on an even more seamless, intuitive and integrated experience.”

The Quickoffice team worked hard to get to where they are now: embraced by many because of their “user friendly, seamless and yet powerful way to view, edit, sync and share documents anywhere, anytime,”  Alan Masarek, Co-founder and CEO, stated, and as they usher in a new chapter with Google, they’ll be “combining the magic of Google’s intuitive solutions with Quickoffice’s powerful products, our shared vision for anytime, anywhere productivity can only grow.”

Nothing specific has been announced but the acquisition is expected to bring more productivity tools for Android devices in the future.  The news comes just days after Google acquired Meebo for their socially integrated chat and marketing tool.

Virgin Mobile to offer prepaid iPhones

Last week Leap Wireless’ Cricket announced that by June 22nd, they would start selling prepaid iPhones with a tag price of $499 for a 16GB version, and $399 for the 8GB version.  Even before they started selling prepaid iPhones, Cricket already has competition.

By July 1 Virgin Mobile will be offering prepaid iPhones in the hopes of reaching a new demographic:  “subscribers who are device and data-oriented.”  The prepaid offering doesn’t require any contract or credit checks for consumers.  Though pricing for Virgin’s prepaid offering is yet to be determined, they currently offer prepaid plans starting at $35 a month with unlimited data use, but speeds will be throttled after the user consumes 2.5 gigabytes a month.  It’s not clear yet if the iPhone will be available on the said prepaid plan or will have its own prepaid plan.

Nokia bolsters feature phone offering

Nokia is banking on the success of their Lumia line – a line of Windows Phone-based smartphones – which are quite pricey like the other smartphones.  Nokia is a bit realistic as they still see the need to offer feature phones – phones that have added features but doesn’t perform like a smartphone. They are way cheaper and affordable for the general mass, and have been Nokia’s most influential line of devices across the globe.

Nokia launched three new members in the Asha family:  Nokia Asha 305, Nokia Asha 306 and Nokia Asha 311 – which are all touch-based mobile devices that gives users a smartphone-like experience.

“By introducing the Asha Touch phones to the market, we’re accelerating our commitment to connect the next billion consumers,” said Mary T. McDowell, Nokia’s executive vice president for Mobile Phones. “These phones deliver on what young, urban people value most — a great-looking device; and an intuitive and affordable experience for connecting to the internet, to their friends, and to a world of entertainment, web apps and content.”

The Asha 311 features 3.0” capacitive touchscreen device that accommodates swipe, and pull and pinch actions, built-in WiFi to stream music and videos, and a 1GHz processor for faster internet browsing.  Asha 305 and 306 allows swiping to access shortcuts on the home screen, and 2G GPRS for internet browsing.  What differentiates the two is that Asha 305 is a dual-SIM phone, while 306 is a single-SIM and the Asha 306 is the most affordable WiFi offering from Nokia.

SpareOne: the ultimate emergency phone

TennRich International launched the SpareOne emergency phone at the Computex exhibition in Taiwan.  What makes SpareOne different from other phones is that it doesn’t have a screen, it’s not rechargeable but it allows you to make important calls during emergencies with its 10-hour talk-time and 15-year shelf life.

SpareOne runs on a single AA Energizer Lithium battery – yes, it specifically requires that brand because the company believes that using any other battery would reduce talk-time and the shelf-life of the the phone.

SpareOne features a torch light (very useful in emergencies), has a volume adjust button, on/off buttons that double as the end-call button, a call button, a numeric keypad, and a lock-unlock button so you won’t accidentally drain your battery.  It comes with the AA Energizer Lithium battery.  Also, it’s available in two GSM frequencies: 850/1900 Mhz which works in North America and some parts of South America and 900/1800 Mhz which works in most parts of the world.  And since this is an emergency phone, even if it doesn’t have a SIM card inserted, it can still make an emergency call.