Bitstream Inc. announced today that the next version of its already popular BOLT mobile browser would offer users the possibility to run Web applications, or what most of us know as widgets. The BOLT browser has been developed so as to work on mobile phones of all types, the company reports, stating that the support for widgets will provide users with increased functionality on their handsets. At the same time, the company further notes that the next flavor of BOLT, version 1.7, will come with Widgets capability in beta as soon as it is launched at the Mobile World Congress on February 15, 2010.

However, the company mentions that BOLT is already capable of running website-based applications that were written in Ajax, Javascript and other Web programming languages, including the Facebook game Mafia Wars and Google Docs, but that the new Web apps are to be installed directly within BOLT, something that should increase their execution speed. Those who use the browser will be able to enjoy discovering and installing specific various apps via the BOLT Widget Gallery, the company states, adding that the mobile browser will offer a list of all installed apps, so that one can easily find and use them directly on the browser.

“As many of the recent mobile and wireless trade shows have demonstrated, mobile applications are part of the mainstream mobile experience,” said Sampo Kaasila, vice president of research and development at Bitstream. “However, the vast majority of phones in use today are ‘feature phones’ not smartphones. Unfortunately for the users of these billions of feature phones, it isn’t easy to find, install and run mobile applications. By adding Web apps to BOLT, Bitstream is not only improving the usability of our mobile browser, we are also making it possible for literally billions of people to partake in the mobile apps revolution.”

Most of you might know already that BOLT is a server-assisted browser which is said to deliver the most accurate page rendering for a mobile browser. The support Web applications will be based on the same cloud computing technology, so that the functionality of the browser is increased on all devices BOLT supports. Bitstream will deliver an initial set of sample applications via its Beta Widget Gallery at launch, and also announced that the web applications for BOLT are written as standard W3C widgets.