8 ms·

HP bought Palm after a five-company bidding war

51 points by sdfx 16y ago

buster 16y ago
My guesses: A - Lenovo B - Samsung C - Google D - HTC
- barredo 16y ago
  I would say C was Dell. All five hardware makers.
  - buster 16y ago
    The reasoning for my guesses: C and D are said to only have interest in the Palm patents. This makes sense for Google, which may have no patents at all in this area, and HTC, which may have not as much as the competition (and with the background of the Apple lawsuit). A and B are said to be interested in both, technology and patents. Lenovo only recently started to get into this business with android phones. It could make sense for them to switch to WebOS. Samsung does Windows Mobile, Android and recently Bada, a linux based operating system. I think, it makes sense for them to build on the existing huge knowledge in this sector and the already existing apps/customers/developers, as Bada just recently launched and didn't get traction yet. Huawei would make sense too, but they are not as deep into the mobile phone business as the rest, i think.
- tdmackey 16y ago
  HTC, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Huawei although Huawei talks stalled early on so they may not be considered.
- joel_liu 16y ago
  My Guess: C is Lenovo. According to " a $60 million penalty if the deal didn't go through. "
jacquesm 16y ago
What about RIM?
- apphacker 16y ago
  Doubt it, RIM already has their own operating system, although it may be that D is RIM.
  - tewks 16y ago
    It is incorrect to dismiss the possibility on that ground: RIM has the worst smartphone OS from either a usability standpoint or from an application development standpoint. They've got major catching up to do; internal development doesn't seem fast enough. We're nearly midway through 2010 and the closest to a decent browser that they've delivered is a few leaked images.
    - megablast 16y ago
      Well, there is no way RIM is going to ditch their own OS, it is incredibly popular and well known amoung business users. They are already starting to add new features catered towards the general public, like Webkit browser, for instance. The only reason they could buy RIM is if they wanted to do their own line of consumer phones, and from what we have seen, Palm has not really taken off yet. So it would be better for RIM to focus on improving their own OS, dumb it down a bit for new users.
    - tdmackey 16y ago
      To speculate that they would be interested just because you don't like their OS and think their development team is too slow is also incorrect. I will agree that their OS is lacking in many areas compared to many of the newcomers in this space, but that doesn't mean they run out and buy another failed phone OS for a whole lot of money in exchange a few features their rapidly growing team could implement or a smaller acquisition like their purchase of Torch Mobile could deliver. RIM's main focus is also more enterprise customers than consumer and the feature set demands of their customers are a little different.

51 points by sdfx 16y ago

buster 16y ago

My guesses: A - Lenovo B - Samsung C - Google D - HTC

barredo 16y ago
I would say C was Dell. All five hardware makers.
- buster 16y ago
  The reasoning for my guesses: C and D are said to only have interest in the Palm patents. This makes sense for Google, which may have no patents at all in this area, and HTC, which may have not as much as the competition (and with the background of the Apple lawsuit). A and B are said to be interested in both, technology and patents. Lenovo only recently started to get into this business with android phones. It could make sense for them to switch to WebOS. Samsung does Windows Mobile, Android and recently Bada, a linux based operating system. I think, it makes sense for them to build on the existing huge knowledge in this sector and the already existing apps/customers/developers, as Bada just recently launched and didn't get traction yet. Huawei would make sense too, but they are not as deep into the mobile phone business as the rest, i think.
tdmackey 16y ago
HTC, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Huawei although Huawei talks stalled early on so they may not be considered.
joel_liu 16y ago
My Guess: C is Lenovo. According to " a $60 million penalty if the deal didn't go through. "

jacquesm 16y ago

What about RIM?

apphacker 16y ago
Doubt it, RIM already has their own operating system, although it may be that D is RIM.
- tewks 16y ago
  It is incorrect to dismiss the possibility on that ground: RIM has the worst smartphone OS from either a usability standpoint or from an application development standpoint. They've got major catching up to do; internal development doesn't seem fast enough. We're nearly midway through 2010 and the closest to a decent browser that they've delivered is a few leaked images.
  - megablast 16y ago
    Well, there is no way RIM is going to ditch their own OS, it is incredibly popular and well known amoung business users. They are already starting to add new features catered towards the general public, like Webkit browser, for instance. The only reason they could buy RIM is if they wanted to do their own line of consumer phones, and from what we have seen, Palm has not really taken off yet. So it would be better for RIM to focus on improving their own OS, dumb it down a bit for new users.
  - tdmackey 16y ago
    To speculate that they would be interested just because you don't like their OS and think their development team is too slow is also incorrect. I will agree that their OS is lacking in many areas compared to many of the newcomers in this space, but that doesn't mean they run out and buy another failed phone OS for a whole lot of money in exchange a few features their rapidly growing team could implement or a smaller acquisition like their purchase of Torch Mobile could deliver. RIM's main focus is also more enterprise customers than consumer and the feature set demands of their customers are a little different.