Palm to Buy Handspring

liam193 writes "CBS MarketWatch is reporting that Palm has agreed to buy Handspring for $169M. If you were purchasing a PDA right now, would you choose Palm, Handspring, or avoid them entirely? I guess one of my concerns is that Handspring has some really cool features that Palm may want to keep. Any merger spells elimination of product lines. So what gets dropped? Palm which has probably a nicer "case" style or Handspring with its less desirable case but some features you don't find on Palms."

Comments

Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't get it - what does Handspring bring to Palm? Certainly a couple of years ago they had nice features compared to the palms of the time, like expansion ports and such like, but now Palm has that too.

Re:Why?

[Netscurror]

Well, there's one competitor less, isn't that something?

Re:Why?

[jtrostel]

Palm regains Hawkins, Colligan (and Dubinsky?). They also get the treo product line, which is a nice, functional pda-cell-phone combo, that actually can last for a reasonable period of time.

The new treo 600 will include an expansion port, which was sadly missing on the earlier treo line. The battery size has been increased too, if early reports can be believed.

Uhhh...

[kikta]

"So what gets dropped? Palm which has probably a nicer "case" style or Handspring with its less desirable case but some features you don't find on Palms."

Wouldn't they most likely use the best features from both?

choose, but choose wisely....

[sweeney37]

If you were purchasing a PDA right now, would you choose Palm, Handspring, or avoid them entirely?

I would avoid both of them entirely, but not because of the sale, but because of the clunky design, smaller screen size, and general lack of innovation. With Handspring came along, it pushed Palm to adapt and made their products cheaper, and smaller. But overall both of their products we're basically the same. I mean how long did it take for Palm to develop USB functionality, even Handsprings came with it right out of the box?

Then the Palm OS market changed when Sony came along, they pulled the 6 Million Dollar Man on the competitors. They made their handheld, faster, smaller and added functionality the others were lacking. I did my research and at the time bought the Clie PEG-SL10 and I haven't looked back. Palm may of been one of the originators but Sony has been the innovator.

I think this sale is bad for everyone, competition always spurs more innovation.

Mike

Re:choose, but choose wisely....

[c13v3rm0nk3y]

I did my research and at the time bought the Clie PEG-SL10 and I haven't looked back.

I also did some research -- for over a year -- and decided on a Palm Tungsten T over anything from Sony. I never considered a PocketPC.

Although Sony did have some very cool features, they all failed the "hand test". As soon as I actually held one in my hand, it felt sort of flimsy and toy-like. I'm left-handed, and it utterly failed the "hold it in the other hand" test. The Tungsten T passed this test for me, and with flying colours.

Over the last few weeks, it has passed all my usability tests, as well. This is where the Sharp Zaurus failed for me; it passed the hand test nicely, but as soon as I used it for any length of time, it's value decrease to almost 0, and off to eBay it went.

Of course, my decision was really made for me this time 'round: I use a Mac at home, and Palm is the only company that really supports Mac OS X.

Elimination?

[thamaht]

A merger doesn't always mean elimination. In many cases there's actual merging.
I don't see why it has to be one or the other. Palm has been smart, and if they continue to be, the features of the Handspring will be added in to the next Palm Pilot revision.

Re:let's face it

[Drakonian]

Depends if you want to carry around a little computer or a PDA. No doubt that PPCs have more features, but they are considerably bigger and suck up the batteries much faster. I prefer PDAs as small as possible - I like the Palm V form factor.

Returning to the fold?

[Malfourmed]

I don't pretent to know my PDA history but wasn't Handspring founded by the guys who created the Palm Pilot in the first place?

Doesn't this make the order of things something like:

1. Guys invent Palm Pilot
2. US Robotics buy out guys - guys make money
3. 3Com buys out US Robotics - guys make money
4. 3Com spins off Palm as separate company - guys make money
5. Guys leave Palm, undoubtedly with money, start up Handspring
6. Palm buys Handspring - guys make money

BTW I'm using the term "guys" generically, I think at least one of the key people was female.

Springboard

[Lxy]

I'm pissed that the springboard slot has been discontinued from Handspring models. I bought mine specifically because of the slot, and I've got several attachments for it. It's by far the most economical way to upgrade a PDA, and they scrapped it. My hope would be that Palm returns the Handspring slot, but I kind of doubt they will.

Re:let's face it

[Fringe]

Well, we have two ipaqs and two Palms. My daily driver is a Palm IIIc, a 20MHz 8MB 160x160 psuedo-antique, while the much newer, faster, hi-rez, 32MB iPaqs sit unused. (The wife has the Zire 71.)

The short answer is, I want what works best on the road for on-the-fly PDA functions. That's Palm. Not Linux, not WinCE, just Palm. And I say this as a developer for all three, whose current day-job is embedded Linux and who has done commercial WinCE work.

The same thing you like about Linux over Windows (excepting open-source, i.e. efficiency, lack of bloat), you dislike about Palm over Linux. It's a specialized system for a specialized purpose, and it works exceptionally well for that. One OS is not ideal for every platform and application!

A Special Kind of Moron You Are

[NDPTAL85]

Wow! They really broke the mold when they created you didn't they!?!

Listen up. The IT (tech) industry is the only industry thats designed to minimize and or eliminiate ITSELF. From the printing press to the cotton gin to the airplane to the computer to the PDA, each technological advance allows mankind to do the same amount of work or more with less people/workers/employees.

Simply put, Handspring is screwing up. They need to be bought or they're out of business. THe only reason to buy them is to gain marketshare and cut expenses. Whenever companies merge there are always redundancies. You don't even know if all of those 125 workers will be tech workers. But does a company really need duplicate anything? Do they need 8 office admins if they previously did fine with 4? Do they need two cooks if they only had 1 before? The same goes for programmers or netadmins. They don't need anymore of those.

Contrary to your idiotic claims there are NOT always alternatives to laying off people. If you are redundant, than you're redundant. Should they keep you on and pay you to sweep the floors instead of eliminating your position? Thats worse than unwise, its insulting.

Perhaps Hewlet-Packard should have just kept bleeding money. Because obviously executive pay always makes the difference. When a company is losing billions of dollars the millions paid out to the top brass REALLY makes a difference eh?

Do you think the technology industry is special or something? That workers in this industry are a special breed of citizen deserving of protections others do not receive? This is what happens to EVERY maturing industry. Consolidation and elimination of redundancies.

DEAL.