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Palm’s Last Chance

Palm had a little investors meeting today where they discussed their future. They announced a new linux based platform (distinct from ALP) and a new hardware platform that is going to be used across their line, saving them a few ducats.

One way or the other, this is going to be their last hurrah. Since all their energies are focused on these new products, I’m sure that’s their pipeline - if it isn’t a home run I’d guess it’s going to be all over for Palm. They just won’t have anything left, getting to third base isn’t going to be enough, it’s going to have to be a perfect device.

I don’t have a ton of confidence in this, seeing as how they have released exactly 1 product with a few different code names over the past several years. But who knows, maybe they did that because they were so focused on building this new linux product (which they say has been in the works for a couple years) that they couldn’t spare any time on their existing line. For their sake, I hope that’s the way it is. The smartphone market is heating up, there’s a lot of pressure to innovate with the impending release of the iPhone and you can already see this in the works with the other manufacturers. The only thing I’ve seen from palm are press releases and the possible rerelease of their treo with yet another model number (755p).

It seems likely that Hawkin’s secret project is probably linux based, although I’m pretty sure he suggested it wasn’t a phone, so who knows what will turn up. I’m curious to see what that is. Very curious. One other thing that gives me a little hope is Colligan’s suggestion that doing everything over the air was a key facet, so sync’ing and upgrading and presumably installing new apps - all over the air. That’s great. It’s also great that they’ll be using Chatteremail as their mail client.

While I’m not going to hold my breath, I will root for these guys. I hope they can do it right, I’d love to see a great linux smart phone hit the streets. I guess we’ll find out, meet you back here in a year.

SEE ALSO:
· Palm For Sale, thoughts on Palm’s future and what Hawkin’s could be doing
· Chatter Email no more, some thoughts on what it might mean for palm