pa1mOne CEO To Step Down

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://news.com.com/PalmOne+CEO+to+step+down/2100-1041_3-5548329.html?part=rss&amp;tag=5548329&amp;subj=news.1041.20">http://news.com.com/PalmOne+CEO+to+step+down/2100-1041_3-5548329.html?part=rss&amp;tag=5548329&amp;subj=news.1041.20</a><br /><br /><i>"[Todd] Bradley, a former Gateway executive who joined Palm in June 2001, will step down Feb. 25 and serve as an adviser to the company through May. PalmOne President Ed Colligan will take on the role of interim CEO while the company conducts a search for a permanent head."</i><br /><br />I wonder how the search will go to find a new CEO to take the lead of the top (only?) device manufacturer for the #2 mobile computing operating system?

[Vincent M Ferrari]

And with the scores of bad decisions made by that company over the past few years, they're lucky Linux and Symbian haven't moved past them. Hopefully whomever takes over will return some form of respectability to the company.

[twalk]

Before Bradley, Palm was losing tons of money because of stupid supply chain issues. To be blunt, none of the Palm executives at that time had a clue. He fixed most of that, and got the company profitable.

Now supply chain issues are not nearly as big a deal (because you can now outsource the whole product and just pick up the finished product). Bradley really doesn't have a clue about the direction of mobile devices, so it was time to get rid of him and bring in someone who can see future customer needs. (An ability that's been sorely lacking at P1. Not that MS, HP, &amp; Dell are any better...)

(only?) device manufacturer for the #2 mobile computing operating system?

Off the top of my head: Tapwave (probably dying), Garmin (just brought out this really sweet Palm/GPS for planes), and Samsung.

Also if you compare Palm, PPC+SP, RIM, and Symbian, all of these are really bunched up close together. (Call me when one reaches 2X the sales of the others...) Sales rate wise, RIM and Symbian (Nokia) are growing much faster than the other 2.

[ADBrown]

Garmin (just brought out this really sweet Palm/GPS for planes)

Also just brought out their new unit based on Windows Mobile.

Also if you compare Palm, PPC+SP, RIM, and Symbian, all of these are really bunched up close together. (Call me when one reaches 2X the sales of the others...) Sales rate wise, RIM and Symbian (Nokia) are growing much faster than the other 2.

We'll see how well RIM continues to fare. As for Symbian, it's vastly overinflated by Nokia's market manipulations. They use a Symbian core in lots of phones never meant for use as smartphones just to pump up Symbian numbers and Nokia's own supposed dominance in the 'smartphone' column. There were some good studies awhile back talking about how something like 85-90% of Symbian users didn't use any applications not preinstalled. As it stands, Palm and Windows continue to be the major players.

[Vincent M Ferrari]

There were some good studies awhile back talking about how something like 85-90% of Symbian users didn't use any applications not preinstalled. As it stands, Palm and Windows continue to be the major players.

I believe that. I'd bet most people with Symbian phones probably don't even know you can install apps...

[wshwe]

P1 botched both the Treo 650 and Tungturd T5 launches. Good riddens to Bradley. Notice they didn't make Colligan permanent CEO, just interim. If they have any sense they'll also dump Colligan.

I bet there are many who never install 3rd party apps on their Palms and PPCs.

[jimski]

I bet there are many who never install 3rd party apps on their Palms and PPCs.

But I bet there are many more who do.

[bjornkeizers]

Oh how the mighty have fallen... I wouldn't be surprised if the Palm platform &amp; company doesn't last another year or two before finally closing up shop.

They're sooooo far behind in the race, it's not even funny. Bad hardware, bad OS, bad marketing...

Someone mentioned the T5? Good example. Reasonable hardware, terrible OS - you wouldn't believe the problems people are having with it. And it even lacks WiFi! Come on - even the cheap Loox 420 has it... and if your PPC doesn't have it already, at least you could add it with a WiFi card; last time I checked, the Palm card still wasn't ready...

Yep, Palm is doomed.

[zetsurin]

We'll see how well RIM continues to fare. As for Symbian, it's vastly overinflated by Nokia's market manipulations. They use a Symbian core in lots of phones never meant for use as smartphones just to pump up Symbian numbers and Nokia's own supposed dominance in the 'smartphone' column. There were some good studies awhile back talking about how something like 85-90% of Symbian users didn't use any applications not preinstalled. As it stands, Palm and Windows continue to be the major players.

Hmm, I find that analysis slightly odd. Perhaps Symbian scales well and as such why not use it? Isn't Microsoft's grand scheme to eventually get .Net into our car or even microwave? 8O

Also, with the current strength of J2ME in the mobile market, there is definitely a more level playing field than there has been on the desktop with Microsoft unable to play OEM lockin tactics this time. My money would be on Symbian in the long run.

[macs4god]

I'd be interested to see if a company such as Tapwave would pursue building a Windows Mobile based Zodiac. I've played with the current Zodiac and have been incredibly impressed at the enhancements that Tapwave brought to the Palm OS to make their device more user-friendly and gaming oriented. They've replaced the standard Palm launcher with a today screen type program that allows you to access all your programs and data quickly, and efficiently with their joystick controller. Their games are also very nice from what I've played with. They've done a lot of what Handspring did with the Treo before being bought out by Palm with the one handed navigation enhancements. There really are a lot of innovative Palm companies out there that could do a whole lot of great things for the WM platform if they gave it a shot.

[SRALPH]

I'd bet most people with Symbian phones probably don't even know you can install apps...[/quote]

I think that depends on the user more than the device. I bet a vast number of RIM, Symbian, PPC and Palm users don't install third party apps either, and are probably lucky just to get the things to sync over USB or serial.

Having recently switched from an iPAQ 3850 to a Sony Ericsson P910a (Symbian UIQ), I only miss a few things - like WiFi and tight Outlook integration. Otherwise, its a great BT phone, a good mobile Web/email client and an pretty good PDA. The form factor is better than a WM phone edition (IMO) and I never used the Word or Excel functions anyway.

[mangochutneyman]

Apparently we now the reason why Todd Bradley, former PalmOne CEO, left... TO HEAD THE PC AND HANDHELD BUSINESS OF HP!!! 8O

http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=7907