[Blizzake]

http://www.pcw.co.uk/personal-comput...pple-bite-palm


""""""Apple to take bite at Palm?

Speculation rife as investors call for sale of handheld vendors
Clive Akass, Personal Computer World 06 Feb 2006
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Speculation that Apple plans to buy handheld maker Palm has been revived by a call from two leading Palm investors for the company to be put up for sale, according to the local paper of both companies.

Mike Nelson, who owns eight per cent of Palm shares, argued that the company is poorly equipped to dominate the market for smartphones which are beginning to eat into sales of traditional PDAs, reports Siliconvalley.com , online edition of the San Jose Mercury.

The drift from PDAs to smartphones is borne out today by a report from analysts IDG.

Palm has sold one million phone-enabled Treos and its stock has nearly doubled in value over the past year.

But Nelson is reported to have told the Palm board that competitors are developing products quickly and could afford to sacrifice profits to gain market penetration.

Another shareholder, with five per cent of Palm shares, also urged a sale of the company late last year.

The fact that Apple has been named as a possible buyer may seem strange to those who recall that one of the most controversial acts of CEO Steve Jobs was to kill off the pen-driven Apple Newton, a pre-cursor of the Palm Pilot, when he returned to the company after a 10-year absence in 1996.

Yet the two companies are closely linked. They are near neighbours and several early Palm employees, including co-founder and former company president Donna Dubinsky, previously worked with Apple.

Palm, at least in its early days, also enjoyed the kind of anything-but-Microsoft fan base that has long sustained Apple.

Jobs tried to buy the company in the late nineties, according to the Mercury.
Neither Apple nor Palm has given any sign that there is any basis for the renewed speculation but there are obvious fits between the two companies.

Apple's Ipod boom can hardly be sustained unless it can head off competition from PDAs and smartphones that can pack music players along with a host a other functions.

Palm itself was slow off the mark in adding tricky telephony technology to its products and Apple would have a hard time starting from scratch in the market.

Also, for all their vaunted style, the latest Apple notebooks look like antiques beside the latest pen-driven Tablet PCs.

The company will sooner or later be forced to offer a pen interface, and could benefit from Palm expertise in the area - especially as tablets are getting smaller, and may eventually supersede the PDA."""""""

[turtle777]

I don't believe sites that write rubbish like this:

Also, for all their vaunted style, the latest Apple notebooks look like antiques beside the latest pen-driven Tablet PCs.

WTF ? How is the iBook design outdated in comparison to farking tablet PC's, that haven't even had market success ?

[Big Mac]

Or the line about the iPod not being able to compete with PDAs and smartphones -

[wdlove]

Very interesting. Would like to see more functionality of the iPod similar to the Palm.

[TETENAL]

So the market is collapsing because phones are taking over the functionality. Why then would it be a good idea for Apple to buy this company?

[Salty]

Originally Posted by TETENAL

So the market is collapsing because phones are taking over the functionality. Why then would it be a good idea for Apple to buy this company?

IP... oh wait no most of the software stuff would have gone with Palm Source...

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by TETENAL

So the market is collapsing because phones are taking over the functionality. Why then would it be a good idea for Apple to buy this company?

They'd buy it to get BeOS for cheap, then scrap Palm.

It's all coming clear now! 10.6 will have Be's legendary video & audio capibillities coupled with CoreAudio and CoreVideo.

Or so I'd like to think.

[Paco500]

Originally Posted by olePigeon

They'd buy it to get BeOS for cheap, then scrap Palm.

It's all coming clear now! 10.6 will have Be's legendary video & audio capibillities coupled with CoreAudio and CoreVideo.

Or so I'd like to think.

Nice idea, but palm does not own BeOS assets. Palm Source did. And they are owned by a Korean phone company.

Palm makes PDA's and Phones, no longer an OS.

[I Bent My Wookiee]

I really don't see what Palm would have to offer Apple.

[ReggieX]

Talk about played out, people were rumouring this years ago. Sounds like a couple of sour losers who want to pump and dump their Palm stock.

[Jawbone54]

iPod + Palm + phone = ultimate portable gizmo.

Not likely, but I can still dream.

[I Bent My Wookiee]

Honestly Newton OS 2.0 was more advanced that any other handheld OS Today.

[slugslugslug]

Yeah, who the hell is Personal Computer World, anyway? Note that the article doesn't back up claims that Apple is interested. And in the linked siliconvalley.com article, that Nelson guy says that Apple could be a good buyer, but doesn't suggest that he has any reason to believe they're shopping.

If Palm were the company it was a few years ago (that is, one with a lightweight, easy-to-use OS that seemed to be in active development), or if PalmSource were still on the block cheap, it might make sense for Apple to buy. But Palm as it is now is primarily a hardware company. Yes, they've integrated PDA and phone hardware nicely in the Treo, but I'm sure Apple has a plan for the possibility that its own markets change enough to make pen input a necessity.

But I honestly don't see a huge upsurge in the market for stuff between the size of a smartphone and a laptop. And if Apple doesn't want to make such devices, they'll still sell lots of MacBooks.

[analogika]

Originally Posted by TETENAL

So the market is collapsing because phones are taking over the functionality. Why then would it be a good idea for Apple to buy this company?

Bingo.

[production_coordinator]

The ONLY thing I can think of is Apple would want the phone part of the company.

Apple + http://palmone.r3h.net/us/images/pro...w_overview.jpg = ???

I think having an iPod video phone could be interesting if connected to .mac in some kind of way...

[JoshuaZ]

THE BEST. IDEA. EVER.

You go Apple. Newton X!

[I Bent My Wookiee]

Originally Posted by production_coordinator

The ONLY thing I can think of is Apple would want the phone part of the company.

Apple + http://palmone.r3h.net/us/images/pro...w_overview.jpg = ???

I think having an iPod video phone could be interesting if connected to .mac in some kind of way...

If Palm can just come up with their own phone I don't think Apple will have a problem.

[slugslugslug]

Does HTC design the Treos? I guess I thought they just manufactured 'em, but Palm actually thunk 'em up. But I am occasionally Wrong™.