Apple, RIM, Google all looked at purchasing Palm 54
HP won the bidding war, but Business Insider is filling out the details of from that intriguing SEC filing that suggested plenty of players were interested in purchasing the company. The named players: Apple, RIM, and Google.
On Apple, Dan Frommer reports:
Apple was mostly interested in Palm's huge library of intellectual property and patents [...] Apple even seemed committed to funding Palm's operations, perhaps to challenge RIM's dominance in the keyboarded segment of the smartphone industry, our source says.
That latter portion seems, well, kind of crazy to us. More believable is that RIM was also in the running - it's a synergy our pal CrackBerry Kevin thought would be a great idea some time ago - RIM has an aging OS, though BlackBerry OS 6 looks to turn that tide. Google was apparently not as seriously interested.
In all, we're pretty happy with how things turned out, as HP looks to be letting Palm act as a fairly independent subsidiary.
Source: Business Insider; Thanks to everybody who sent this in!
54 Comments
I think we are all very glad that HP was the one that bought Palm
I know I am. Although Palm remaining independent would have been nicer. It seems with all the extra funding from HP this is for the best.
+1
I don
A great reason for HP to buy Palm and leave them alone and give them money. Which so far seems like the direction they've been given. HP probably realized the potential of having inovators like Palm and went with the deal. Which is why they kept the Palm name.
Apple isn't half as innovative as they've convinced the public they are. The average Joe thinks Apple invented both the mp3 player and the smartphone. While they did improve these devices, Apple's #1 asset always has been and always will be their marketing.
Their #1 asset is making super reliable hardware, loading it with near idiot proof safe and secure operating system, and giving it a pleasing UI.
I love my Palm, but for a Palm lover to Apple bash is idiotic. Have you watched the developer videos with Ben and Dion? What are they sitting behind? I'd bet that the great majority of Palm developers are NOT a PC.
Love ALL things great.
:)
Super reliable hardware that loses signal when held? No thank you.
Apple's #1 asset is DEVELOPERS!!! Without the App store the iPhone would be nothing but a boring OS.
"with near idiot proof safe and secure operating system"
You just proved the point that it's all marketing.
I worked in IT support for a school that is Mac only, and I can tell you it's no more safe than Windows or the likes.
I worked in a creative team that was 60% Apple and tried to get converted over to Mac. It was a mess. Between my IT guys and hired guns from top line Mac servicers, it was a total cluster-f trying to make a G5 reliably handle its apps, network connections and local hardware.
One of the biggest headaches was "corrupted system files" that were "imported from external resources". The techs would never ever use the V-word, and they were the only ones taking that POS onto the web to that point. The day before I told them to take the G5 away, they'd installed something that had a folder named "Symantec Security" in order to "stabilize Entourage". I'm happy living beyond the Mac community, not sure who to trust.
copy all things gr8
http://m.gizmodo.com/5483914/steve-jobs-1996-good-artists-copy-great-art...
"safe and secure" I didn't know cell phone were dangerous.
Kool Aid much?
Gosh, why would someone who is a fan of a wide open development platform like WebOS dislike Apple? That's like wondering why a proponent of democracy would think badly of a fascist dictatorship (I'm not calling Apple/Jobs fascists, it's simply as far away from Democracy as you can get).
Designers in general are very Apple-oriented because Apple is itself very design oriented, both tactile and visual. As someone who has two degrees in design, I can tell you designers WILL choose form over function and convince themselves that a product that looks better actually meets their needs better, even if it obviously does not. The iPhone is gorgeous in it's simplicity, I can't think of a single Apple product that I would call ugly. But that doesn't make them superior and it certainly doesn't make them innovative, which is the point of discussion here.
Apple's #1 asset simply is not something you hold in your hand or set on (or under) a desktop. It's the image held in the mind of the marketplace, the image crafted by their marketing department. In the modern world image IS everything.
YA SOON TO BE HP ENVY USERS
If you want to be honest.
1) While Apple isn't as innovate as people make them out to be for sure. Apple gets credit for so many things they did NOT come up with. It's actually pretty disgusting how many people are brain washed into thinking Apple created something they didn't. But Apple DOES come up with minor innovations with wide ranging impact. There's lot of little innovative things in iOS that are awesome. Spring back for example. No spring back makes things feel... less responsive.
2) Apple creates generally stunning industrial designs. Let's be honest, the iPhone is pretty damn sexy. Macs/Macbooks are sexy too.
3) Apple takes GREAT CONCERN with creating a pleasant interface. Check out how smooth and simple iOS is compared to webOS. webOS bogs down and gets choppy all the time. iOS does it far far less than webOS does. webOS takes a long time to do some things that iOS does immediately. Check out scrolling. iOS grabs the screen within your finger moving 5 pixels. webOS does after like 10-15 pixels. iOS is very intuitive and easy to figure out. It's all minor things objectively, but it makes a huge difference to the average user.
4) Apple DOES have a great marketing department.
There's a lot of issues with Apple and their products, but you have to give them credit for more than just marketing. You can't market a turd and have it as successful as the iPhone. I'll be honest here too. I love webOS more than iOS, but I'll have to say even if the Pre had the marketing push Apple had, the iPhone will STILL win because it's a better product for the average consumer. It's far more responsive, less buggy, and more intuitive than webOS. webOS has more potential, the iPhone/iOS has far more polish. Potential matters more for geeks, polish matters for the average consumer. Therefore it's Apple's win.
Thats funny because my iPhone bogs down all the time and is generally unresponsive, requiring me to do a hard-reset. No tweaks either.
Let me guess...iOS4 on a 3G or 3GS? :)
My friends that upgraded to iOS4 off of their 3G iPhones have seriously regretted it. It killed the speed and responsiveness like crazy.
No....
Even before iOS was released.
I agree with prety much everything there except #3 (my iSheep friends complain about the responsiveness of their phones all the time).
I especially agree with your first point. I don't consider Apple to be innovators, rather, they're refiners. They take good ideas and improve them, and they deserve credit for that. But improvement and pretty icons is not innovation.
My friend's iPhones have all been very responsive. I have...like 7 or 8 friends/family with iPhones and all of them love how smooth and responsive it is. Well, that is until iOS4 ruined their 3G phones. And from what I've played with it, the iPhone 3G and 3GS runs circles around the Pre (before iOS4 I must say, the ones that switched to iOS4 hate it). That said, when on vacation internationally when I turned my Pre on Airplane mode, I was surprised how much smoother it ran.
There's a reason why the iPhone has the highest level of user satisfaction of any smart phone. People can try to argue it all they want, but it's there in numbers, and it makes sense if you consider MOST of these users are "common" users, not techies.
Apple, I would say, does more than just refine and improve things. They take a great concept that's been done, grab a few other already done concepts and ideas and tie it together with _a few of their own minor innovations_ into a beautifully done package. It's just they're not the leaders of INNOVATION, they're leaders of POLISH (but some of that polish comes from minor innovations). Android and webOS have as much innovation as the iPhone, but not nearly as much polish.
I find this really ironic because I would consider myself an Apple semi-hater. I really respect the product, I respect the company even though I don't agree with a lot of their choices, but I REALLY REALLY hate the fan boys. I "hate" the iPhone because I wish the fan boys would just STFU. But here I am defending them. Hah, who would've thunk?
It's just absurd to me that some haters refuse to acknowledge
1) The iPhone changed the face of smart phones. Smart phones went from being for techies and people who HAD to have email access 24/7 to being something for the mass market. Don't believe me? Look at how many people have iPhones and look at what kind of people they are. Before only business people or techies had smart phones. Now, high school kids, the elderly, techies, jocks, musicians, actors, actresses, they all have iPhones.
2) The iPhone is a good phone. Sure it's nice to believe that millions of people are brainwashed into buying a turd, but that's not what it is. The iPhone is an awesome smart phone, definitely not without flaws. Like I said before all smart phones have major flaws.
Re: Point #1 I disagree wholeheartedly. I don't know how old you are, but as someone who is part of what could be called the 'internet generation' the iPhone was not an innovation, it was an inevitable step. My classmates in college had already started moving to crackberries and Palms (like myself) because email and text were the primary forms of communication. The iPhone brought it mainstream because it looked cool. There is zero cool factor to a crackberry or the late PalmOS phones. It didn't matter that my Cetro could do more than the iPhone could when it first came out the iPhone looked amazing and it looked simple (even if it wasn't simpler than the centro).
Many of the innovations Apple gets credit for (and claims as their own) were borrowed from elsewhere or innovated by others first. There's another company out there with a multitouch patent that predates Apples. The Mouse and Graphic User Interface were first developed by another company (xerox perhaps?) discarded as an idea and Apple 'borrowed' it
Re: Point #2 - So millions of people can't be wrong eh? I love when iSheep use that logic and then start to gibber and fume when I ask about Apple's 8% market share.
People are sheep, they'll buy what's cool or popular regardless of quality, otherwise Linux would rule the world.
...you're EXACTLY what I'm talking about, totally blind to the point of spewing stupid stuff. You hate to the point you're JUST as bad as the "iSheep" you're talking about. It's pretty damn ironic.
Look, the bottom line is blind hate is just as bad as blind love.
I don't feel like arguing with someone who likes to believe everyone who doesn't have the same point of view is a blind fan boy, but what the heck, I'll give it one little try.
1) Microsoft, Palm, RIM have all retooled (MS and Palm did COMPLETELY) their smart phone OSes to be mass market friendly AFTER Apple came on the scene AND kicked ass. It's pretty obviously a reaction to the success of the iPhone (and declining sales). Plus read what I said about Apple and innovations again. /eyeroll
2) Advertising is a hell of a powerful thing, but personally I think it's silly to think it can explain everything (like the fact that everyone I know is very satisfied with their iPhones and while some are sheep, some were very skeptical about it at first plus the fact that the satisfaction rate of the iPhone dwarfs all other smart phones). Yes, you can always argue that they're all dumb and only you and people who think like you are "smart". :-/
apple designs.... Genius
http://m.gizmodo.com/343641/1960s-braun-products-hold-the-secrets-to-app...
Thank you. Please remember that this story was about Apple buying Palm, not the iPhone buying Palm. Apple as an entire product line and company is certainly innovative. Add to that the meticulous design/build of their products. Add to that the way to make it easy enough for ages 2 or 82 to use their products. Throw in a great browser, no-thinking-required interfacing between products... come on.
I love my Pre, and would not prefer the iPhone... but I would not go back to a PC from my MacBook. And I'd rather use webOS on a solid device with a retinal screen :)
Innovative is different from inventive. Apple doesn't claim to have invented the smart phone, mp3 player, or computer. They have innovations in their products that make their hardware the best. They may not have all the features as others, but they have the best over all designs. Look at their laptops, they are the best quality out there because of their innovations like the uni-body chassis. Anyone can stick an hdmi port in a laptop, but that's not innovative so that's not what apple focuses on. P.S. I do think webos is the most innovative phone os right now. I wish apple bought palm to integrate webos ideas into iphone. Oh well, I love my pre plus!!
"WebOS gestures are mostly designed for the right-handed user". Not really, the gestures work on both sides for both right and left handed people... i don't see how they're only for right handed users. :)
Of course. It was a joke, silly, regarding the antenna issues
For something that is nearly perfect, it has one majorrrrrr flaw with it's antenna.
It's certainly amazing how brainwashed people are, isn't it? There was talk about recalling this product and people think it's "near perfection?" oooookay
All of them would have killed webOS, except for RIM, but HP seems a better fit than just another smartphone maker.
+1000 to that. If Palm had been bought by any of these others, WebOS would be dead.
Thank God Apple didn't buy Palm. We'de all be holding our iPalm phones the wrong way.
awesome graphic
I know I loved it. Good job.
Now I'm really happy HP was the final buyer. I can't imagine Apple behind webOS, the first thing they would do would be kill the homebrew community.
I beg to differ... Apple might have a strangle hold on the iPhone, but the relationship between the MacOS and its developers is amazing.
In short: we don't have to jailbreak MacOS to install apps we downloaded off BitTorrent. I can do anything I want on MacOS, and Apple won't stop me.
Which makes me find the way Apple treats the iPhone as being very uncharacteristic of them...
the big thing besides the intlectual property Apple would of gained is the fact they could of left Palm alone for awhile because of the iphone being on exclusivity with AT&T but Palm isn't which means Apple could of put WebOS on a device similar to the iphone4 and been able to finally get money from Verizon and Sprint.. Granted once exclusivity is up at AT&T they then would of absorbed Palm into Apple.. That would of been sad..
RIM wouldn't of killed WebOS.. They need a new OS.. And ya they have a new one coming out but from what I have been reading up on it the only real change is the browser.. Soooo ya
HP is the best choice though. They are almost as big as Apple just on the PC side of computers. Yet they don't have a device like an iphone which means they could keep Palm alive like they are and get back into being a major player in the mobile side of computing.... Forget about trying to make an iphone killer... The main focus is making a Black Berry killer... After all they are bigger then iphone.. And apples gonna kill their iphone anyways at this rate with the botched up iphone4 problems.
Speaking in terms of marketshare, HP should focus on making a BB-killer. However, and more importantly, Apple and the iPhone have the largest mindshare. That's why every new touchscreen device that comes out purports to be an "iPhone killer" instead of a BB-killer. If you put it up against the most recognized name in smartphones, it automatically generates interest. Face it, when 95% of people think of a smartphone, they're thinking of an iPhone.
As far as the IP Apple stood to control, could you imagine card-based multi-tasking on an iPhone? People would go ape$hit for that. That would've been nuts.
Almost as big as apple on the PC side? hahahahahaha
HP is the #1 PC manufacturer with 25.7% of the US market (17.4% worldwide) compared to 9.8% for Apple.
"HP... Is almost as big as Aple just on the PC side".
Actually, Apple isn't anywhere close to HP on the PC side. The most recent numbers I found were from Spring 09 when Apple shipped 1.21 million macs. That same quarter HP shipped 4.17 million pcs.
Apple is a big, wealthy company, but HP is in a whole other weight class.
Apple has 34,00 employees.
HP has 304,000 employees.
Who's bigger?
:)
I wished Google has brought Palm.
Why, so they can throw webOS in the garbage? Out of all those choices, HP and RIM are the best ones. RIM might have worked with webOS to try to make it more business-friendly, but Apple and Google would have taken the patents and kicked webOS to the curb.
True. RIM would have used it to modernize its smartphone line, but HP is going to use webOS for all of its non-PC/server products. That is a much bigger pie. :)
to be honest all I just want is voice recording and some other cool fest like synergy for fb,myspace,twitter,soundcloud
a soundcloud player
a possibility to play youtube vids ,own vids,pandora and mp3 as backround music while recording a video or doing voice recorder as long as I get that then it was cool but till then I still regret having the palm...to be so limited even though this phone can do it easy
if apple would have purchased palm, we would finally had itunes sync back. Forget apple, go palm/HP. Patiently waiting the next webos device. Hope that it comes soon, my sprint pre is falling apart( silver tab on the earpiece came off, usb door broke off)
I'm glad Palm has the financial backing from HP it needs to continue webOS development, but as I've said in other posts, I hate HP hardware. As long as Palm develops & manufactures future hardware I'm in, but if HP decides to put webOS on their hardware, I'm done. I was pulling for HTC, but I'm certainly glad Apple nor RIM bought em. I woulda jumped ship July 1!
I would have agreed with you about two years ago but HP hardware has actually gotten better.
I'm glad HP bought Palm, because that'll guarantee the life of WebOS.
Had Apple bought Palm, I could hope that Apple saves the WebOS, and they could have... but there wouldn't be that sure feeling initially, like we have with HP.
It would have been interesting to see Palm under Apple's wing... Apple and Palm has had a very close relationship many times in the past--if I recall correctly, Palm was inspired by the Apple Newton, and I've been told that many Newton developers and engineers left Apple for Palm. I could be wrong... but if I'm right, that means a lot of Apple's heart and soul is in Palm.
Furthermore, I've always seen Palm and Apple as being bretheren, to the degree that I have no doubts to Palm's future success ONLY because of the example Apple set with their success... and how Apple was teetering upon death until Jobs turned them around.
Nice article Dieter.
Which one do you think offered the $5.50 per share and the 2 week closure?
Which one do you think offered the $600 million cash?
I'm happy that HP purchased Palm. It is a great match and I really would love to see new WebOS devices and features on solid and fast devices. Imagine, WebOS on your mobile phone, tv, tablet/laptop, house phone, conference phone at work, and other devices... say you are on a phone call, get into the office, grab and throw the call to your office phone, instant transfer; watching a movie from your phone - grab and throw onto your TV, it enlarges, and continue watching without a missed heart beat. Or getting directions from your tablet and throw it your phone and gps and directions are ready to go - or to the car, sharing games between tv, phone, tablet, laptop...if they go that far... but it's really endless on what aspects they can do to integrate.
If WebOS went to Google or Apple - and they didn't keep it alive, I'd jump back to a Windows based device.
Apple was mostly interested in Palm's huge library of intellectual property and patents
All Apple wanted was the patents - then every time anyone wanted a gesture area on their phone, or card-like multi-tasking they would have to pay Apple.
Apple would have let the Pre Pluses sell out, then let Palm disappear. Their developers would have been moved over to Apple but webOS would have died a death. The iphone doesn't need webOS, it has a perfectly usable OS. They may have integrated some of the back-end ideas into iOS, e.g. some memory management ideas for multi-tasking, but that would have been it.
RIM probably would have kept webOS alive on their phones, I'm not sure I like their range though.
I can't see why Google would want anything apart from the patents and/or current customers.
please don't let the fashion designer post again....