Opera Mobile 9.7 headed to Android, says CEO

Android will be the next mobile platform to receive Opera Mobile 9.7, Opera Software CEO Jon von Tetzchner confirmed yesterday in an interview with PCMag Network.

Opera Mobile 9.7 was released in its first beta in June on Windows Mobile and Symbian devices, adding new server-side optimization called "Opera Turbo" which promised to substantially speed up page rendering when users browse the Web on a 2G connection.

Android's only taste of Opera browsing thus far has come in the form of Opera Mini 4.2, which was released in beta in late 2008 and then released as a stable version in the Android Market in January 2009.

Meanwhile, usage of Opera Mobile has been skyrocketing. In June, more than 26.5 million users accessed the Web with Opera Mobile, 143% more people than last year.

Von Tetzchner did not say when the Android version of Opera Mobile 9.7 will be released.