Slashdot Mirror
Apple to Buy out Palm?
JFlex writes "According to a story over at Personal Computer World '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.'"
...the Infinium Phantom will be released next month!
(Seriously...this "Apple to buy Palm" rumor has been going on forever...)
If Apple could make a Newton / Palm hybrid, it'd be the ultimate PDA.
According to a story over at Personal Computer World [two leading Palm investors have created the]Speculation that Apple plans to buy handheld maker Palm [in order to drive up the stock price before they dump it and make loads of $$$.]
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
Apple could jump back into the market with the Blackberry struggling/in limbo, and offer the sort of solution they're famous for - one which somehow integrates all parts of the product's chain. They could stick Safari on it, and have it synchonize histories and emails with the home iMac/mini, as well as having some sort of iDisk related fun (which will have to drop in price).
I don't know... If people start downloading pron from iTunes straight to the iPalm things could get iHairy.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
I'm rather suspicious of this story, in part because I don't see Palm adding much value to Apple. When the Palm Pilot was popular, the fact that so much could be fit in such a small device was nothing short of amazing. It was also a useful little tool for all kinds of data organization. But now? Palm's OS is older than the hills, designed for hardware limits that no longer matter. Palm has been using bits of trickery to extend the limits of their OS, but at the end of the day they just need something new that takes advantage of modern, low-power hardware.
Another problem is that Palm has been about as phlegmatic as you can get when it comes to promoting their market. If they were like Apple, they could have sewn up the electronic book market years ago. Instead, they seem content to allow the rest of the market to make half-hearted attempts at producing solutions. That just isn't going to work. If Palm wants to grab the e-reader market (a market for which they are extremely well suited), they need to follow Apple's lead and grab the bull by the horns. Since they show no signs of doing this, I see nothing but signs of decline for Palm.
If Apple wants to enter the handheld market (again), I see them developing a new device with a high-resolution, high-pixel density screen. They would then try to add the ability to show documents are precisely as possible, utilizing scaling algorithms. (Many books and documents suffer if their layout is changed a la Acrobat Pocket.) These features could be easily built into a new device OS by Apple engineers rather than trying to overhaul the aging Palm OS.
They would then market it with a new "catchy" Apple brand like "iHand" or "iBooklet", and either integrate it into a new eBook/Portable App section of iTunes, or develop a new iTunes-like app.
So given this scenario, where does the Palm value come in? The name? Nope. Apple would want consistent branding. The OS? No way. Palm is so full of cruft I swear that the developers are ready to shoot it. The device designs? Never. They're way too far behind the curve.
So I think I'm going to go with "rumor" on this one.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Palm Source is working on Palm OS.
Palm Source isn't owned by Palm. It's owned by a Japanese company whose name I can't remember.
Palm don't own their own OS these days.