Toshiba Leaving The PDA Business?

[Janak Parekh]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://translate.google.com/translate?sourceid=mozclient&u=http%3A//www.windows-mobile.ch/xoops/modules/news/article.php%3Fstoryid%3D58' target='_blank'>http://translate.google.com/transla...%3Fstoryid%3D58</a><br /><br /></div>This tidbit of news has been flying around the 'Net, so while it's still a rumor, I guess it's worthwhile to mention it. Windows Mobile.ch reported (English translation link above) that, when they called Toshiba Switzerland and asked them for information on the e800, they were told that e800 production has been stopped and that that Toshiba would "not sell any more PDAs"... and that the press had yet to be notified of this fact.<br /><br />If this happens, it'll certainly be quite sad -- <a href="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=28592">first Sony</a>, then Toshiba? However, I think we need to wait until we hear more official statements -- otherwise, why would Toshiba have gone to all the trouble of releasing WM2003SE updates for the e405 and e805? And why wouldn't they have officially announced it yet?

[Ecks]

wow..that is some serious news..i do hope that it isn't true. It would be such a shame if it were.

[dean_shan]

Noooooooooooooo

Let's hope this is just a rumour. I love Toshiba PDAs. I don't care if Sony left but Toshiba is my baby.

[ppcsurfr]

Here is something which I think goes beyond technology...

Clutures...

I think there is a problem with the difference in cultures here... If you notice, these companies seem to survive pretty well with their domestic market... I think they even release more devices in their own market than they do outside Japan.

Outside Japan, we all look for customer care and upgradeability.

In Japan they look at being able to replace their device with a whole new one when it comes out.

We've seen it coming... who are the companies that refuse to furnish users upgrades unconditionally? None comes to mind. They may have upgrades simply to boost the marketing of their current devices which are supposed to come out earlier than WM2003SE... But will they offer it for their other devices? Not at all...

Until they get a grasp of the market that is not their own... we'll never see a following as strong as that being enjoyed by HP, Dell, and other smaller companies that are offering these precious updates.

Mabuhay! ~ Carlo

[yankeejeep]

You'll recall that a similar rumor was circulating shortly before the SE update was posted in Europe for the e800. They may be considering stepping out of the US market, which would help explain the delay in getting a US release of the WM2003SE ROM image, but there seems to be a lot of European activity for a company preparing to leave the PDA market altogether. I really hope this is just another crazy rumor that has gotten started because folks are antsy about SE status in the US. I love my 805 and have talked a couple of other people into getting one.

[ScottC]

They may have upgrades simply to boost the marketing of their current devices which are supposed to come out earlier than WM2003SE... But will they offer it for their other devices? Not at all...

Until they get a grasp of the market that is not their own... we'll never see a following as strong as that being enjoyed by HP, Dell, and other smaller companies that are offering these precious updates.

Mabuhay! ~ Carlo

Care to point me to the WM2003SE upgrades from Dell or HP? I think Toshiba was one of the few that DID offer these upgrades to existing customers.

IMHO Toshibas problem was that they didn't really make any devices, at least Dell and HP design and manufacture (part) of their devices, the Toshibas were 100% outsourced and were pretty much like what the 1940 is to HP. Margins on products like that are pretty slim and it's a hell of a market to be working in.

I'm also assuming they have some MAJOR quality issues, for the scale of their market share there were simply too many refurbished devices out there, pretty much every retailer had refurb e405's in stock.

[Marcel_Proust]

The major thing this little tidbit signifies is a slow news day.
Little morsels about Brittney would be just as good.

[bbarker]

And why wouldn't they have officially announced it yet?
Maybe so they can sell existing inventory?

I hope this doesn't happen. The current Toshibas are excellent devices.

[ppcsurfr]

They may have upgrades simply to boost the marketing of their current devices which are supposed to come out earlier than WM2003SE... But will they offer it for their other devices? Not at all...

Until they get a grasp of the market that is not their own... we'll never see a following as strong as that being enjoyed by HP, Dell, and other smaller companies that are offering these precious updates.

Mabuhay! ~ Carlo

Care to point me to the WM2003SE upgrades from Dell or HP? I think Toshiba was one of the few that DID offer these upgrades to existing customers.

IMHO Toshibas problem was that they didn't really make any devices, at least Dell and HP design and manufacture (part) of their devices, the Toshibas were 100% outsourced and were pretty much like what the 1940 is to HP. Margins on products like that are pretty slim and it's a hell of a market to be working in.

I'm also assuming they have some MAJOR quality issues, for the scale of their market share there were simply too many refurbished devices out there, pretty much every retailer had refurb e405's in stock.

Offering it for new devices... which are supposed to be designed for it is nothing really... so I don't see anything special with the Toshiba offerings yet... but consistent updates or at least a track record that shows HP and Dell have actually offered such upgrades is something to consider.

Toshiba has a different view on upgrades... remember the EUUs and how Toshiba almost refused to release any?

We're so used with Japanese products here in the Philippines... and we're so used to seeing people get these japanese devices which are on the shelves in japan for a limited time only...

There is a difference in market culture...

Carlo

[ppcsurfr]

And why wouldn't they have officially announced it yet?
Maybe so they can sell existing inventory?

I hope this doesn't happen. The current Toshibas are excellent devices.

The way Toshiba works makes me believe that they want to force their own culture on others...

"This device has this version of the OS... you want the latest OS, buy the newest device... Oh... you want the one with the updates... we have that version too... it's the one with the larger ROM too... Buy it... then you'll get what you want..."

Well this is how I see them... this is my opinion based on how I know Asian culture... I do hope they don't go this way...

Mabuhay! ~ Carlo

[Kevin Daly]

I have two thoughts on this:

1)For all their faults Toshiba are an innovative company, and the market needs competition from them to keep the likes of HP on their toes

2)It would be a strange time for Toshiba to withdraw, because their headstart with VGA gives them an opportunity to gain some traction.

[BTS]

I certainly have loved my Toshiba over the past year. When you think about it, it was Toshiba that ushered in the "thin" Pocket PC. They also were responsible for having one of the more affordable PPCs before Dell came along.

My only gripe with Toshiba has been the lack of support for older products. I bought my e750 in July 2003 (with WM 2003). By the late spring I could no longer buy accessories for this device from Toshiba.

Otherwise, they make fine units and, hopefully, this story is just a rumour.

[gorkon280]

This tidbit of news has been flying around the 'Net, so while it's still a rumor, I guess it's worthwhile to mention it. Windows Mobile.ch reported (English translation link above) that, when they called Toshiba Switzerland and asked them for information on the e800, they were told that e800 production has been stopped and that that Toshiba would "not sell any more PDAs"... and that the press had yet to be notified of this fact.

If this happens, it'll certainly be quite sad -- first Sony (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=28592), then Toshiba? However, I think we need to wait until we hear more official statements -- otherwise, why would Toshiba have gone to all the trouble of releasing WM2003SE updates for the e405 and e805? And why wouldn't they have officially announced it yet?

CompUSA has been out of e805's for a while now and the store manager here has said that they have been discontinued at CompUSA.

[gorkon280]

They may have upgrades simply to boost the marketing of their current devices which are supposed to come out earlier than WM2003SE... But will they offer it for their other devices? Not at all...

Until they get a grasp of the market that is not their own... we'll never see a following as strong as that being enjoyed by HP, Dell, and other smaller companies that are offering these precious updates.

Mabuhay! ~ Carlo

Care to point me to the WM2003SE upgrades from Dell or HP? I think Toshiba was one of the few that DID offer these upgrades to existing customers.

IMHO Toshibas problem was that they didn't really make any devices, at least Dell and HP design and manufacture (part) of their devices, the Toshibas were 100% outsourced and were pretty much like what the 1940 is to HP. Margins on products like that are pretty slim and it's a hell of a market to be working in.

I'm also assuming they have some MAJOR quality issues, for the scale of their market share there were simply too many refurbished devices out there, pretty much every retailer had refurb e405's in stock.


Toshiba has never released SE here in the US either. As far as I know, noone has.

[Janak Parekh]

The major thing this little tidbit signifies is a slow news day.
Little morsels about Brittney would be just as good.
Yep, it's that time of year. But I think Britney is a little offtopic... ;)

Toshiba has never released SE here in the US either. As far as I know, noone has.
Well, the Axim X30 has it, but yes, no one has offered upgrades yet. If I remember correctly, Toshiba said it'll be sometime in July... :|

--janak

[epdm]

There are several reasons why Toshiba is unsuccesfull.

Although they exell in technical superiority with regards to PDA's, its clear that wrong marketing, lack of vision and unsuccesfull penetration in certain markets breaks this company. This is due to some factors

1) Brand visibiltiy is very important. This is measured by a strong presence in the computer retail chains. Small shops play an insignificant role in this. And in many retail chains the only brand that has a distinct vissibility factor is HP. They also have a tremendous productline to enhance this factor. While Toshiba is only recognised for their laptops. But the small selection of Toshiba cannot compete to the big vissibility of HP. Not that I like this, in fact I don't! Because in the end we get large multinationalistic mediocere products charged with premium prices and the deotriation of innovation.

2) Toshiba's lack of customer commitment. Toshiba is well-known for it's bad customer support. While this doesn't harm a company's repution too bad in the early stages of productcycles, it does become critical in later stages. In this case newer products will be neglected by potential customers due this reputation.

If this is true of Toshiba leaving the market too, then I'm in a big dillema. Since I got my E800 broken, recieved a voucher for that amount but can't find a decent replacement with the same or similar functionality :-(
This even makes the question whether I'd actually get that left-over E750 that I found or obtain the E400-GPS-packagedeal more important.

Any ideas? E750-wifi for 399 euro's or E400+GPS mouse and software for 399 euro's? The former has a faster clocked cpu but older video subsystem (and I don't know how good the E750's screen is compared to the E400 except that it's 3,8"instead of 3,5" while the E400 can be upgraded to WM 2003SE and is simply a newer model)

regards,

Manu T

[MacBriar]

This certainly is a shame as Toshiba's machines are solidly built and generally they do innovate. However as a former E330 owner who couldn't upgrade to 2003 from 2002 and was left with a non-SDIO compliant SD card slot I wouldn't say I am altogether suprised. Even when looking at Toshiba laptops there always seems to be an accelerated product cycle.

Just my 2 pence (maybe someday 2 cents - Euros and all)

Ewan

[corphack]

no loss, except that I won't have Toshiba to kick around anymore.

I think I'll be able to suffer their absence...

[jlp]

Noooooooooooooo

Let's hope this is just a rumour. I love Toshiba PDAs. I don't care if Sony left but Toshiba is my baby.

Well according to PDA enthusiasts from France a few weeks ago and this Swiss PDA site now, they got this information from their respective Toshiba local branch.

So this is not a rumor, it's a confirmed fact; the message that a Wiondows-Mobile.ch user got was signed "TOSHIBA Europe GmbH, Swiss Sales Branch". (FWIW, GmbH means LLC in German).

Remember, Casio also left the US and European markets about a year ago to concentrate on the Japanese market as well. Their newest model the Cassiopeia E-3000 is manufactured by a Taiwanese company, Asus I think.

NEC also stopped manufacturing PPCs and HPCs

Sharp stopped making their Mobilon line to concentrate on their nice but discreet Zaurus line.

Also 4-5 years ago European company Philips left the PDA market they helped develop.

And Sony quit as well (except for their local market, so they say :?: :!:).

Handspring was bought by Palm and other PalmOS licensees quit or are very discreet at best.

Now Toshiba is slowly giving up, waiting for their stocks to clear out before the official announcement.

There were some persistant rumors about Dell going to do the same, they haven't released something significantly new in many months (after the X5, the X3 was a new device; the X30 is only an update to the latter; the rumored X7 is so since about a full year ago).

OTOH do you remember my various comments in different threads about my feeling that the PDA as we know it yet would disappear within 2-3 years?

Many factors account for this. Shrinking margins is one, plumetting sales is another, while some of you invoked other various reasons.

All are true.

And Toshiba has been working for many years on their Dynapad and other prototypes of pocketable PCs à la OQO or Flipstart.

Intel has been working on a reference platforms for such devices.

NEC has shown advanced prototypes as well.

IBM too and Antelope Tech has licenced their design and is manufacturing something very closely based on IBM's work.

OQO (est. by former Apple and IBM top notebook engineers, amongst others) and Vulcan (est. by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen) have shown evolving prototypes, while the first is promising actual release this Fall and everything shows they are on schedule.

OTOH MS seems to be lethargic at best regarding PPC advances.

WM03 is essentially the same as PPC2000; the WinCE core changed to 4.2 probably because PPC programers at MS didn't want to/couldn't (policy?!) work on older 3.0 code; PPC layer apps like P.Word, P.XL P.IE, etc. are 99% the same. New code essentially supports newer technologies that came on the market since 2000: BT, Wi-Fi, VGA, etc.

Important bugs and irritating "features" don't get squashed or fixed.

MS acts like they have the minimal interest in the platform.

OTOH, there is much more money to be made for manufacturers and MS in building pocketable PCs than (very low margins) Pocket PCs :wink:

[Ed Hansberry]

Noooooooooooooo

Let's hope this is just a rumour. I love Toshiba PDAs. I don't care if Sony left but Toshiba is my baby.

Well according to PDA enthusiasts from France a few weeks ago and this Swiss PDA site now, they got this information from their respective Toshiba local branch.

So this is not a rumor, it's a confirmed fact; the message that a Wiondows-Mobile.ch user got was signed "TOSHIBA Europe GmbH, Swiss Sales Branch". (FWIW, GmbH means LLC in German).
How does the same rumor appearing on a French and Swiss site with the supposed official letterhead from the Swiss division make this a confirmed fact?

I am not saying the rumor isn't true, I don't know if it is or isn't. It still seems a rumor to me though, nothing more. When I see a press release from Toshiba or an interview on a news site with someone really in the know, not a branch salesman on the other side of the world, then it becomes a confirmed fact for me.

[atsouch]

I have the same information from the distributor and sole representative of Toshiba in Greece. Toshiba plans to get out of PDAs, at least in Europe. They stopped giving us wholesale prices and they only have a small stock of some Pocket PCs.

This company,"Toshiba Hellas", is very happy about this situation because they also distribute Palm devices and they had a very big conflict of interests.

[jlp]

Noooooooooooooo

Let's hope this is just a rumour. I love Toshiba PDAs. I don't care if Sony left but Toshiba is my baby.

Well according to PDA enthusiasts from France a few weeks ago and this Swiss PDA site now, they got this information from their respective Toshiba local branch.

So this is not a rumor, it's a confirmed fact; the message that a Wiondows-Mobile.ch user got was signed "TOSHIBA Europe GmbH, Swiss Sales Branch". (FWIW, GmbH means LLC in German).
How does the same rumor appearing on a French and Swiss site with the supposed official letterhead from the Swiss division make this a confirmed fact?

I am not saying the rumor isn't true, I don't know if it is or isn't. It still seems a rumor to me though, nothing more. When I see a press release from Toshiba or an interview on a news site with someone really in the know, not a branch salesman on the other side of the world, then it becomes a confirmed fact for me.

A rumor by definition is a general opinion. These are statements from official employees who have been given instructions by their hierarchy. Tho it's not a press release, [b]it's as official as it can get otherwise[b]. AND it's coming from 2 different sources at different moments and from the European importer.

So you can't use the word rumor as it is none. Hope you understand the difference between "a rumor" and "words from official employees", (as I understand the difference between "words from official employees" and "a press release" :))

[jlp]

rumor:
1 : talk or opinion widely disseminated with no discernible source
2 : a statement or report current without known authority for its truth
We now have at least 3 known authorities from very discernible sources...

[Constant Caffeine]

If they do get out of the PDA business, I do feel bad for those who have purchased their products.

On the other hand, if this does happen, I hope Toshiba will focus on their other current issues.

Many of their other products are terrible. The company I work for uses Toshiba laptops, desktops, monitors and PDA’s. We have had a 43% of our laptops have to go in for warranty repair. Our company also has Toshiba e740/750’s as a standard. We have had 25% of those failed in our office and they were replaced. Toshiba quit making desktops and we switched to HP. Because Toshiba has poor customer service, we are looking at replacing them with either HP or IBM.

If you have not had any problems with your Toshiba product, I think you’re a very lucky person.

When you boot up a Toshiba laptop it reads “Toshiba – In touch with tomorrow”. I only hope they are in touch with tomorrow because they are not in touch with today.

[jlp]

To close the circle, have a read at Brighthand's article "More Evidence Toshiba Exiting Handheld Market" (http://www.brighthand.com/article/More_Evidence_Toshiba_Exiting_Handheld_Market) that mentions this present thread as well for their source for the WM.ch post :D

[eclecticlibrarian]

I love my e755. However, I suspect that by the time it dies or becomes significantly out-dated, portable computers like OQO will be common enough for me to get one without handing over half my salary.

It's too bad that so many are getting out of the PDA business just when they were starting to get more flexible and functional.

[sdemirel]

If toshiba quits PDA bussiness I will fell very sory for the ones who didnt purchased E800 yet .

It is (and it will for a foreseeable future) the only PDA which can display true VGA

New VGA devices will not have this feature . Sorry guys

[Janak Parekh]

New VGA devices will not have this feature . Sorry guys
Huh? Are you talking about VGA-out? That might be the case, but all of these devices will have true VGA LCDs.

--janak

[jlp]

I guess he's talking about the non SE ability (found on the first e800) to display 4 times the QVGA (hence what he calls true VGA), and not enhanced QVGA like SE does; in other words enhanced QVGA basically dispays the same screens as QVGA but with finer fonts.

Did I guess correctly?!