Palm expected to move approximately 623,000 Pre phones in first quarter 4
Thu, 04 Jun 2009 11:55 am EDT 
A recent article in Reuters didn’t reveal much new about the device itself, but plenty about Palm the company. Reuters quoted James Faucette of Pacific Crest on Palm’s skyrocketing stock price (up nearly 300% from the Pre unveiling on January 8, and an astonishing 740% from its December 5, 2008 low):
“If you're buying (PALM shares) now, definitely what you're looking at is that they're going to have the most valuable asset in the industry. At some point, somebody will want to pay a premium for that. From a products perspective, the impact on the market is probably as important as iPhone.”
Reuters also surveyed five different analysts for the estimation of how many Pre phones Sprint will manage to sell during the next quarter. The estimates ranged from 500,000 to 865,000, with an average of 623,000 units, which while not anywhere near iPhone numbers, would still be an increase of close to 30% of the last quarter (and that’s not including sales of other phones Palm produces, like the Treo Pro). Even with the increased unit sales, it’s not likely we’ll see Palm moving financially into the black anytime before the end of the year.
Thanks to Phenomenon for the tip!
4 Comments
is next quarter this quarter?
if not, when will this quarter end and how many do they expect to sell this quarter?
This quarter is pretty much from now until the end of September. Next quarter is October-December.
For some reason I think it's ridiculous to compare how many iPhones sell *now* with how many Pre's they anticipate will sell. Though the iPhone did sell very well initially, it was not in the same numbers that the 3G has been selling (at least that's how it seems). Apple *did* sell 270,000 iPhones in 30 hours back in 2007 on launch. It'll be interesting to see how many Palm / Sprint even have on hand and how many of those move over the first weekend.
Most of the people who went and bought iPhones were already iFanboys.... Most of them are mindless mac users who have no control over what they actually do (hence apple is their god). That being said I think these numbers are fair based that the Palm Pre is a new device, it is also running a new OS for a device. There is no palm pre PDA, no pre-pod touch prior to this device, its fresh from the gates, locked and loaded.
Only time will tell what really happens. If sprint is smart and this sells like that, they will reinvest and try and get the exclusivity agreement for more than 6 months. If it doesnt sell, then I think we can say byebye palm, and someone will buy them up... *Hoping this sells like hot cakes*