America Online has acquired mobile software company Wildseed and set up a wireless division in Seattle as part of its foray into the fast-developing world of mobile access to music, games, calendars and other content on their cell phones and other handhelds, reports the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. The newly created division includes AOL Mobile, Tegic (text messaging) and Wildseed and is led by a former Microsoft executive. AOL is competing against Google, Yahoo and Microsoft in the mobile market, and it is apparently most interested in Wildseed software capable of improving mobile video, music and search.

The leading players have made recent moves in the mobile marketplace: Google began offering local search for mobile phones; Yahoo introduced a texting service for getting local search listings; Microsoft bowed a new version of its mobile software for downloading music, video and pictures and has made inroads in local search.

Though the market for mobile content is still small, most analysts agree it is changing and is poised to take off. Only some nine percent of Americans have accessed the internet on a mobile phone, and an estimated 20 percent of them have downloaded a game, ring tone or other content.