Abstract. We have developed TakaTuka, a Java Virtual Machine optimized for tiny embedded devices such as wireless sensor motes. TakaTuka1 requires very little memory and processing power from the host device. This has been verified by successfully running TakaTuka on four different mote platforms. The focus of this paper is TakaTuka’s optimization of program memory usage. In addition, it also gives an overview of TakaTuka’s linkage with TinyOS and power management. TakaTuka optimizes storage requirements for the Java classfiles as well as for the JVM interpreter, both of which are expected to be stored on the embedded devices. These optimizations are performed on the desktop computer during the linking phase, before transferring the Java binary and the corresponding JVM interpreter onto a mote and thus without burdening its memory or computation resources. We have compared TakaTuka with the Sentilla, Darjeeling and Squawk JVMs.