GigaOM » Palm

HP planning a new Android tablet? Good luck with that

Kevin C. Tofel — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 20:27:16 +0000

Having burned through two prior mobile platforms, HP is said to be looking at a third and will use Google Android for an upcoming tablet and possibly a future phone. Taylor Wimberly of ReadWrite reported the development with information from two sources familiar with the matter. The new Android tablet could be announced from HP within a few weeks; potentially at this month’s Mobile World Congress Event in Barcelona.

Wimberly’s sources indicate an HP tablet has been in the works since Thanksgiving and is likely to run on Nvidia’s Tegra 4 chip. Nvidia officially announced Tegra 4 at last month’s Consumer Electronics Show but had no mobile partners on stage to announce new products or designs with the chip. Instead, Nvidia showed off its own hardware, a handheld gaming console called Project Shield.

I’m not too skeptical of HP actually re-entering the tablet market. After all, the PC business is giving way to fast-growing sales of tablets and smartphones. Plus, HP was already in the tablet market once before: It bought Palm and its webOS platform for $1.2 billion in 2010 and built the HP TouchPad tablet around webOS. Unfortunately, the device was a sales flop and HP quickly killed the tablet as well as its whole investment in Palm and ended up giving much of the platform to the open source community.

HP’s mobile history goes back even further, however. More than a decade ago, I carried an HP iPaq handheld running on Microsoft’s Windows Mobile software. HP eventually got out of that market too, prior to smartphone adoption really taking off. So it makes sense to me that HP could be making another mobile play here, even though HP CEO Meg Whitman has gone on record to say no new smartphones will be coming from HP this year.

I’m more skeptical that HP can be successful in this market. The problem as I see it is that HP has no other choice but to use Android at this point. And assuming it does, it’s now competing against Samsung, the top seller of smartphones and the only company that’s figured out how to make a profit by using Android. Then there’s Amazon, which uses Android for its Kindle Fire line of tablets. It makes money by selling content to the devices; something that HP doesn’t have to offer.

For HP to be successful in the already established Android market it needs to offer something significantly different and innovative. Those aren’t qualities that I equate with HP these days, but perhaps as they say, ”third time’s a charm.”

This story was corrected at 1:47pm with the correct source site of ReadWrite.

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Why many are unlikely to switch to Windows Phone or BlackBerry 10

Kevin C. Tofel — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 23:23:01 +0000

The smartphone industry is at an interesting point in time. In 2007, Apple’s iPhone practically invented — or re-invented, if you will — the current smartphone age with a full capacitive touchscreen and support for mobile apps. Google Android followed in 2008 and although it was slow to catch up, is relatively on par with iOS in terms of usability and app support.

Can Microsoft and RIM succeed where others have failed?

These incumbents — Apple and Google’s Android partners — account for 89.9 percent of smartphone sales as of the third quarter of 2012, per IDC. Some alternative platforms, such as Palm’s webOS and Nokia’s Maemo software, entered the market only to disappointingly disappear: webOS is now an open-source platform and Maemo became MeeGo, which Nokia abandoned when it chose to use Microsoft’s Windows Phone software. Windows Phone has been around for two years but has relatively little in the way of sales to show for it.

With Windows Phone 8, however, Microsoft now has its best chance for success. It appears that Research In Motion’s BlackBerry 10 system, which will be unveiled on Jan. 30, is RIM’s last-ditch effort at relevancy as well. I’ve used, and like using, Windows Phone 8 and I also like what I’ve seen from RIM as it has shared limited details of BlackBerry 10. But I’m unlikely to switch platforms now and based on the timing of these two products, I expect many current smartphone owners to avoid switching as well.

What can a new smartphone platform offer at this point?

There are a few reasons why I think this, with the first being the maturity of the current smartphone platforms. After five years in this current age, all the heavy lifting is done, meaning the biggest platform breakthroughs have already been made. Put another way: All of the recent incremental upgrades to iOS and Android are just that: incremental. The pace of change for a native smartphone operating system has slowed and the changes themselves are mainly small features or minor user interface tweaks.

Of course, it’s always nice to have more options. And in my opinion, some native smartphone features are actually better on Windows Phone than on Android or iOS.

The People hub in Windows Phone, for example, makes it easy to see all of your contacts, their social status, updates and photos. While the approach is sound, and perhaps even better than contact management on alternatives, one could always add Facebook sync to their phone for a similar experience. So the value of the People hub is diminished when making comparisons.

And while RIM employees I’ve spoken with tell me that the BlackBerry fan base is excited by BlackBerry 10, nobody at RIM answers me directly when I ask, “Yes, but what feature(s) will broaden the BlackBerry base?” which has been shrinking over time.

Consumers aren’t buying hardware, they’re investing in platforms

I’ve been saying this for months, if not years: The battle for smartphone dollars is only partially won or lost by the hardware itself. The longer a handset owner sticks with one platform, the more they invest in content and apps that only work with that platform. This lock-in cost — something I mused about over two years ago — is a potential barrier to switching. And for those who invested early in a platform, as much as four or five years, its highly unlikely a switch will occur. Who wants to re-buy premium apps, books, videos and other content?

To Microsoft’s credit, it has more of a platform play than Research in Motion does. Between Windows 8 and its Xbox Live service, Microsoft has a wide range of support for music, videos, games and more. So far, however, that platform strength hasn’t equated to Windows Phone sales. Microsoft’s Xbox 360 has the been the best-selling console for 23 consecutive months and total lifetime unit sales hit 70 million as of Microsoft’s most recent fiscal quarter. Yet, Windows Phone shipments in the third quarter of this year are estimated to be 3.6 million handsets. To put that in perspective: 1.3 million Android devices are activated each day. And Apple just sold 2 million iPhone 5 handsets in China during this past weekend.

Maybe there won’t be a third-horse in this race after all

Barring any major smartphone advances by Microsoft or RIM now, neither appears poised to become a third horse in smartphones, at least when it comes to smartphone switchers. Bad timing and prior consumer investment are sure to hold back both platforms, at least in areas where smartphone penetration has already reached the tipping point. Could either of these do well in other regions, however?

Yes, they can, but the upside appears limited in my opinion. Even in areas where the smartphone population is low, both platforms are competing against low-priced but still capable Android handsets or older, and less expensive, iPhone models. Even so, I think the idea of catering a low-cost device to first-time smartphone buyers — exactly what Nokia is doing with its Lumia 620 — is a smart play at this point. That strategy may not get you or I to switch platforms, but it could rack up sales through first-timers.

Whether you currently own a smartphone or still have an old feature phone, I’d be curious to hear your thoughts: What will it take for you to switch to or initially start with Windows Phone 8 or BlackBerry 10?

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Palm’s webOS lives on…. as an Android app

Kevin C. Tofel — Wed, 28 Nov 2012 17:06:50 +0000

Palm webOS fans left in the cold from HP’s debacle with the mobile operating system can rejoice a little. HP open-sourced the webOS platform, making for some interesting third-party webOS efforts and giving the platform a new lease on life. Some developers have ported the operating system to different devices, but that can be a cumbersome user process. What if you could run webOS on any Android device as an app?

Turns out, the possibility is slowly becoming a reality: Phoenix International Communications is getting closer to running webOS on Android with a single tap. The effort is considered “pre-alpha” so it’s not even close to ready for prime-time. But, as shown in this video, the proof-of-concept project proves it can be done:

Without hardware acceleration, the webOS environment is super-sluggishly slow, of course: You’re not going to run this now and get the performance of webOS on native hardware. Still, this is progress, says WebOS Nation, which notes that in mid-October, the team at Phoenix couldn’t even get past the lock screen.

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Game of Phones: Open webOS proves “what is dead may never die”

Kevin C. Tofel — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 19:13:40 +0000

True to its word, HP released version 1 of the Open webOS software for mobile devices before the end of September. A beta version was available for months prior, but this edition, released last Friday, includes support for the Enyo development framework so that developers can create JavaScript apps for devices running the new platform. Open webOS software is the direct descendant of Palm’s webOS, which HP bought in 2010 for $1.2 billion and effectively shut down the platform after disappointing HP TouchPad reviews and sales.

When HP decided to open source some of its webOS assets, I wondered what might become of the effort. Clearly, I wasn’t thinking enough of the tinkerers out there that port software to new smartphones and tablets because those very folks have wasted no time in getting Open webOS on at least three devices already.

The low-cost Raspberry Pi — a small, $35 computer with an ARM chip and various other input/output components — is already running on the Open webOS platform, courtesy of an enthusiast known as “aaa801.” The system boots into a terminal console on the Raspberry Pi as there wasn’t a user interface available at the time of the project. But HP surely has an interface: The company ported Open webOS to an HP SmartTouch computer, building a desktop-like version of the webOS environment:

Need more proof that webOS is gaining a second, third or fourth life? The versatile Galaxy Nexus smartphone already has a working port, although hardware acceleration isn’t up to speed. As a result, the operating system isn’t what I’d call usable by a typical smartphone user. But it looks nice – see the video here — and shows what could have been had HP maintained its hardware efforts from the Palm purchase. HP has recently said it would be getting back into the mobile market, but my suspicion is that it will do so with Microsoft Windows Phone as the primary system.

Last up — for now, anyway — are reports of the Asus Transformer Prime being the latest Open webOS device: The Android tablet has a work-in-progress version of Open webOS that sounds promising, mainly because the Prime has a keyboard dock to go with the touchscreen tablet. Again, like the other ports, there’s a ways to go before folks can easily install the new platform on a Prime and run it without fear of crashes or other issues. Still, progress is being made in short order.

So what’s to be gained here for fans of Open webOS? I’m thinking of a system that’s similar to Google Android in that it can easily be tweaked and installed as people see fit but without the backing of carriers. That second point is a good one in my eyes. Carriers still have an abundance of control over which mobile devices and platforms are supported. If Open webOS maintains or increases its momentum, it could be the platform where users are in control. Not the majority of users, of course — most people still like supported ecosystems and devices — but for a select group, Open webOS will continue to live on and on.

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Ex-Nokian hired to accelerate HP’s global tablet strategy. (It has one?)

Kevin C. Tofel — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 16:04:24 +0000

“Our new Mobility Global Business Unit initially will focus on consumer tablets and will expand to additional segments and categories where we believe we can offer differentiated value to our customers.”

HP’s Todd Bradley shared news of a new business unit in an internal memo tipped to The Verge. Alberto Torres, former EVP at Nokia and once in charge of the company’s Meego platform, will head up the unit. His first initiative, according to Bradley: “accelerate our tablet strategy and begin to execute products against our consumer/SMB target.”

I’m almost dumbstruck on the timing of this. First: What global strategy does HP even have? It gave one up — along with $1.2 billion — when it bought Palm in 2010 only to produce one tablet that it soon cancelled in 2011. The company this year open-sourced Palm’s webOS platform. Bradley is likely talking about Microsoft Windows RT and Windows 8 tablets, but HP isn’t even one of the first hardware partners for Windows RT.

Given HP’s history in the mobile market, all the way back from PDAs through smartphones, and later, tablets, this move reeks of desperation. And the sad thing is: the company that knew that the mobile market was important enough to invest $1.2 billion into it, only to see all of the “differentiated value” of the deal disintegrate like mid-morning fog over the San Francisco Bay.

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CES 2012: a recap and analysis

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 23:40:31 +0000

This year’s CES was the biggest in the show’s 44-year history, boasting 15 miles of exhibit hall aisles, 3,100 booths and 153,000 attendees. The Kerton Group sent three delegates to CES to scout out new products, listen to keynotes, watch announcements and get tips from insiders. This report, which bundles those findings together, serves as an outline of the major launches and overarching trends at CES (think smartphones for $0, Androidification and connectivity) as well as an analysis of what those developments mean for the larger consumer electronics picture. Companies mentioned in this report include Apple, Tesla and T-Mobile. For a full list of companies, and to read the full report, sign up for a free trial.

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WebOS lives! HP decides to open source the platform

Kevin C. Tofel — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 18:34:45 +0000

After on-again, off-again news about the webOS mobile platform, HP has come to a final decision: WebOS will be offered to the open source community. HP will still be involved in the platform to help developers and aid in governance for webOS. The choice effectively gives a third life to the platform, first developed by Palm and later purchased by HP.

In a press release sharing the news, HP CEO Meg Whitman touts the mobile platform as robust enough to power future devices:

[W]ebOS is the only platform designed from the ground up to be mobile, cloud-connected and scalable. By contributing this innovation, HP unleashes the creativity of the open source community to advance a new generation of applications and devices.

HP spent $1.2 billion to acquire Palm and its webOS resources in April, 2010, but the investment hasn’t paid off. It took more than a year for the company to design and build the HP TouchPad tablet running webOS, which was never considered successful. At least not until the price was drastically reduced to $99 when HP decided to leave the tablet market it only just entered.

With the operating system now to be open sourced, we could see device makers build new phones or tablets with it, as no licensing fee would be required. This is similar to Google Android, but the challenge for webOS is the ecosystem. Android has become the most-used smartphone platform to date and developers are writing apps for it, as well as Apple’s iOS devices. WebOS still has many fans — myself included — but doesn’t have as strong of an ecosystem.

It’s also possible that HP itself could jump back in the mobile hardware game, but of course there are no guarantees. My suspicion is that this scenario would only play out if the open source community gave HP a reason to do so by maturing the platform and third-party software offerings.

Other hardware makers could play a wait-and-see game too, although I’d rule Samsung out as using webOS: The company has quietly developed its own Bada OS, which is gaining an audience and gives Samsung a backup plan for Android. Not that it needs one yet.

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Yes, HP May Finally Have Some News On WebOS — In The Next Two Weeks

Ingrid Lunden — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 20:19:00 +0000

After a disastrous wireless turn from HP (NYSE: HPQ) that culminated last week with HP taking a charge of $1.66 billion to wind down its webOS mobile platform operation, HP’s CEO, Meg Whitman, has finally put a date on when the company will announce the fate of webOS: in the next two weeks.

That is according to an interview that she has given to the French newspaper Le Figaro (via TNW), in which she also notes that there are about 600 people left working in webOS, which further complicates its fate.

WebOS has been hanging in the air for months now, after HP abruptly announced this summer that it would discontinue making smartphones and other devices using the OS — just weeks after it had launched its first tablet, the TouchPad.

Since then, there have been rumors of potential buyers (including Amazon and Oracle); and even the thought that HP might hang on to the OS itself. After all, it already made one spectacular u-turn when it decided to hold on to its PC business, after former CEO Leo Apotheker had said the plan was to get rid of it.

Last month, it looked like HP was finally ready to spill the beans on what would happen with the platform business — with Whitman calling an all-hands meeting with staff in the division — but ultimately there was no news. Either that, or whatever news she hoped to deliver still hadn’t been finalized, because nothing came of that meeting.

The webOS platform held a lot of promise when it was first unveiled by Palm (which HP bought only last April for $1.2 billion). Its many supporters believed it provided an effective and engaging counterbalance to the trailblazing power that Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Google (NSDQ: GOOG) wield in the world of smarpthones and tablets. But today, with an almost negligible market share, it will take a lot of enterprise, attention, and investment if anyone hopes to get webOS up to speed again.

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WebOS app development chief flees to Xobni

Ryan Kim — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 15:00:09 +0000

You might have heard that Hewlett-Packard is still trying to sort out what it wants to do long term with its webOS mobile operating system. There’s been rumors of a massive shutdown and talk of salvaging the old Palm-designed OS or selling it off. But it’s clear the uncertainty is not a way to retain talent.

The latest sign is the departure of Michael Rizkalla, the former senior director of webOS application development at HP, who just started at Xobni, where he will be its senior director of mobile applications, according to his LinkedIn profile. Xobni tries to make inboxes and addresses books smarter on Outlook and BlackBerry through its software and recently introduced apps for Gmail and Android. Rizkalla exit follows the retirement of Chief Strategy and Technology Officer Shane Robinson and the departure of Richard Kerris, vice president, Worldwide Developer Relations for webOS. Palm also saw a number of executives leave after it was bought by HP last year.

The departure of Rizkalla highlights the bigger problem for HP. Even as it debates the future of webOS, the fact that it’s potentially on the chopping block has to be sending plenty of signals to the entire team. HP has already confirmed it would be pursuing layoffs of the webOS team, reported to be more than 500 people. The question is what happens to the rest. Do you wait for HP to shut you down or hope for a reprieve? Why not just take matters into your own hands.

At Palm and HP, Rizkalla was responsible for shipping some of the core apps on webOS and previously led the development of webOS 2.0. Now, it looks like he’ll be heading up engineering for Xobni’s mobile products. How many other talented people leave the webOS team before any decision to keep it or discard it becomes moot?

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HP considering webOS fire sale

Erica Ogg — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 15:53:58 +0000

You sort of knew this was coming: Reuters reports that Hewlett-Packard is looking to unload webOS, the mobile operating system it got when it bought Palm last year, at a huge loss. It has hired Bank of America Merrill Lynch to explore the option, according to the report:

Hewlett-Packard Co is evaluating a potential sale of its webOS software platform in a deal that could fetch hundreds of millions of dollars but likely less than the $1.2 billion the company paid for Palm Inc in 2010, said four sources close to the matter.

But wait, there’s more. The company said to be interested? HP’s good friend, Oracle. Yes, the enterprise software company (one that doesn’t make consumer-facing software or devices) and one of HP’s biggest competitors. It’s also the company founded by Larry Ellison, who takes every opportunity that comes along to tweak HP, including hiring as president the CEO that HP sent packing over a sexual harassment claim.

This summer HP decided to stop selling the TouchPad, the device expected to showcase and justify the billion-dollar bet on webOS, a little over a month after it went on sale. The company said at the time it still planned to develop and support the OS, but it was not interested in making the hardware for it. But reports since then indicate the company has been considering a sale.

A lot of really embarrassing things have occurred at HP over the past year-plus. But from Mark Hurd’s expense-report-related indiscretions to Leo Apotheker’s hiring as CEO without meeting with most members of the board, his incredibly short tenure thereafter, and the decision to float the idea of selling the PC division only to take it back a few months later, Tuesday’s news is probably the thing that disappoints mobile tech enthusiasts the most.

But it’s not disappointment in HP as much as it is disappointment in how the company that basically invented mobile computing, Palm, is meeting its end.

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