Since its $210 million acquisition of Firethorn Holdings LLC in November 2007, Qualcomm Inc. has wasted no time in forging relationships with big banks and wireless phone carriers to support mobile banking, which is growing in popularity.

Celent, a Boston-based financial research firm, said that in 2006 just 215,000 households were using mobile banking, a number that jumped to nearly 1.4 million in 2007.

This year, Celent estimates total users of mobile banking will climb to 5 million, and 20 million by 2010.

The San Diego-based communications giant has announced nine partnerships with financial institutions to offer mobile banking on wireless handsets, signed an additional 14 and is in talks with yet another, said a spokeswoman.

Qualcomm said it has already partnered with several national banks, including SunTrust Banks Inc. and Wachovia Corp.

“(The acquisition) truly has differentiated Firethorn in the industry overnight and we were already the market leader with our relationships with AT&T, Verizon, Citi Cards and other big financial institutions,” said Tripp Rackley, who runs Qualcomm’s Firethorn unit.

Mobile banking is transforming the way consumers interact with their financial institutions from their mobile handsets by providing an easy to use, easy to find and secure solution to banking on the go. Consumers can view balances, transfer funds and pay bills with a single password.

CitiCorp’s Citi Cards unit announced its partnership with AT&T and Qualcomm on March 31. AT&T handsets will be preloaded with the Firethorn mobile banking applications to access Citi’s mobile banking site.

AT&T executive Mark Collins said that the benefits customers experience on handsets that are pre-loaded with Firethorn mobile banking applications are the foundation needed to drive continued mass adoption of the mobile commerce market.

Celent research indicates eight of the top 25 banks now offer mobile banking, and that number is expected to climb to 14 banks by the end of 2009.

Qualcomm would not reveal revenue, income or market share projections as a result of the acquisition.

It did release a forward-looking statement that said Qualcomm expects a $0.02 dilution to pro forma earnings per share in its fiscal year ending September 2008 and a neutral impact on fiscal year 2009 earnings per share.

Rackley, who has an Internet banking background, said both companies did not look at mobile banking as mobilizing the Internet, but as creating a mobile wallet.