Facebook is seeking more partnerships with wireless-service providers and phone makers, according to a statement from the company yesterday. About 13 percent of Facebook customers access the site using their phones, the company said.

Facebook already has applications on devices such as Apples iPhone and the BlackBerry, which let users post updates and send messages to their friends. The company is working with phone makers to tie Facebook more closely to mobile devices, allowing users to merge their phone contacts with their Facebook friends.

Global visitors to Facebook more than doubled to about 222 million in December, making it the worlds seventh most popular Web site, according to ComScore Inc., a research firm in Reston, Virginia. The site overtook its biggest rival, News Corp.s MySpace, last year as it expanded its base of users beyond college students.

Phone makers are also working on other Facebook features, such as displaying Facebook profile pictures when contacts call, the company said. The INQ1 phone, offered by Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. in the U.K., combines Facebook profile pictures with users address books.

Palm Pre

Palm Inc.s Pre, due to be released later this year, will be able to display information from users calendars. The Pre uses a new operating system developed by Palm called the WebOS.

Facebook is in discussions with Nokia, the worlds biggest maker of mobile phones, to include Facebook features in its devices, the Wall Street Journal reported. Espoo, Finland-based Nokia is considering whether to strike a partnership with Facebook or build its own service, the newspaper reported.

The companies may make an announcement at the GSMA Mobile World Congress next week in Barcelona, Spain, the Journal said.

Nokias press office didnt return an e-mail seeking comment.

Facebook, founded by Harvard University dropout Mark Zuckerberg in 2004, makes money by selling ads next to users profile pages. The company struck an agreement in 2006 to show some ads sold by Microsoft Corp.

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