Handheld Manufacturers Continue Retreat

About the only ones that will be upset are the "feature creepers" that can't afford new cars to show off to dates here.

I wonder what this guy's smoking. And where I can get some...

Wake up, little buddy. There is NO good money to be made in sales of regular PDAs anymore. Period.

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

Amen. For now.

But the Treo 600 is still a pretty nice compromise for all those sick of lugging around two separate devices. A few people on this site have Photoshopped very creative Treo designs that would finally almost eliminate the need to compromise. The Sony P910 is also not a bad design, but it's still too big to be a nice phone.

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

I only use my cellphone for emergencies and the occasional "I'm here, where are you?" call. So I use Tracfone because I only pay $100 a year for service and minutes, and I've never run out.

If I could get a Treo 650 while only paying for a Tracfone type plan, I would be really tempted. If I have to get a regular cellphone plan, it becomes too expensive.

Though, what I really want is just a Tungsten E level palm with a thumbboard.

Jon Acheson

"All opinions posted are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled."

JLM.

Actually, Iwonder if Sony and Toshiba's latest releases (outside the US)were just caused because they were so ahead in development that they had to go out or is it just true that the Japanese market is more profitable than the US market. Maybe time will tell if we ever see another release from Sony, an OS6 Clie???

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Current fan of a 320x480 tablet shaped Palm with built in BT+Wifi for less than US$450

Kay

With over 20,000 Palm OS programs available, and more being written all the time, how could it be that there is no market for the hardware?

If Palm is bankrupt as you imply, then you are right, they cannot stay in business. However, at the moment, they look good to me.

Maybe you should check your facts.

The fact is you and I are just outsiders. Neither of us know their future marketing plans. The main difference between us is that I admire genius and can see it in a company based on past perormance. You cannot. You can only predict gloom and doom, and you can't even factor in past performance.

Just pretend you won this arguement and go away.

I think the Treo 650 shows Palm is betting the farm on smartphones. It's their only hope to survive.

You can only predict gloom and doom, and you can't even factor in past performance.

Past success means NOTHING. Just look where Netscape and Apple are now.

There has not been a GENUINELY compelling design since the Palm Vx.

I disagree with that assertion. Yes, the Palm V/Vx was a brilliant design and probably made Palm most of its reputation (and profits!). In fact, Palm still touts the V on their website as being one of their models! http://www.palm.com/us/ But the Tungsten T3 is also an excellent design. The only problem is it's poorly constructed. The Treo 600 was also a great design, but Palm really didn't have anything to do with it.

My point is that P1 could still hit a homerun (even in today's market) if they'd get something out there that had a great screen, reasonable feature set, metal V-style housing, and was priced attractively. You still see plenty of executives hanging onto old Palm Vs, Visors and m505s.

I really think Palm has given up on trying to innovate in the PDA market. The money simply isn't there, so this is probably a smart business decision. Even now Palm's (actually Ideo's http://www.ideo.com/portfolio/re.asp?x=50008) V design looks fresh and seems naturally suited to the executive environment. Taking out a Palm V is still a bit of a fashion statement, much like Zero Halliburton briefcases used to be. Bringing out a Palm V with a high res color screen would make a lot more sense than spewing out more garbage like the Tungsten 5.

Of course the R&D and marketing war chest required to pull off such a thing is sadly beyond P1's means nowadays. We'll be lucky to get another candy-coated Zire and another T|E cousin running Cobalt next year, I fear...

No R+D is necessary to make nicer packaging. Palm already has the V design and all the parts PDAs use are "off the shelf". It's simply a matter of bringing the design to a manufacturing house and Voila, "Presenting the Palm X".

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

As for me personally: if I were to loose my Zire 72 I would go right out and buy a replacement - either the same or the next level of improvement. I doubt that PalmOne will ever stop making PDA's.

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/sec?s=PHHM

Read the past few years of Palm's SEC filings and let me know if you still think they're an "excellent business company".

I doubt Palm will stop making regular PDAs soon, but the writing's on the wall. Smartphones will probably generate more than 50% of Palm's revenue in 2005 and I wouldn't be surprised to see them pare their PDA lineup down to 3 or 4 models.

Palm's business strategy seems to make absolutely no sense. Why the he11 won't they get PalmOS into some cheap, basic phones? Imagine PalmOS running on phones like these:

http://tinyurl.com/yt2hu
http://tinyurl.com/5rkge

Get PalmOS into "regular" phones ASAP, become ubiquitous and watch the spinoff profits soar once people see what the OS can do.

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

Ahem. Palm doesn't "rule" the PDA market. I believe their market share dropped over 50% in the past couple of years alone. And the competition is dropping out because they feel the PDA fad is on its way out, so the potential returns in this diminishing market don't warrant continued investments. Toshiba, Sony, etc. apparently decided to cut their losses before things get ugly. Once the pie shrinks some more, I expect Dell and HP to flex their muscles and kick a few tons of sand into Palm's face.

Also, while you say that Palm is not earning as much money as they used to, you must admit that they are still earning more money on PDA's than any other company.

Ahem. No. If you cut through the B.S. accountantspeak in their SEC filings, Palm hasn't had a profitable quarter since around 2001. I believe they could have turned a profit in their most recent quarter, but once you factor in stock option payments to Palm executives (namely Nagel, and the Jeff 'n' Donna twins) loan payments, etc. I believe they were actually in the red again. Dell probably earns more per PDA than Palm does and HP also probably earns more profits on PDA sales than Palm. Now if you're saying Palm's REVENUES (not PROFITS) from PDA sales is higher than its competitors, you're probably right.

I think you would even agree that they are in an excellent market position for expansion into the cell phone area and great improvements on standard PDA's.

Palm's been "in an excellent market position for expansion" for over 5 years and has done precious little to capitalize on this. They've had ample opportunity to drive a stake through the heart of WinCE/PPC, yet continue to give Microsoft more chances to get a foot in the door. Don't look now, but I think Microsoft's got more than their foot in the door this year.

Handspring's engineers created a minor miracle and somehow hacked the PalmOS into a slick smartphone OS. They handed this over to Palm, giving Palm more than a year's head start on the competition and what does Palm do? Nothing. Over one year after the Treo 600 all they have to show is another baby step: the Treo 650. The Treo 650 is what the 600 should have been in the first place. Where are the 3 and 4 ounce phones running Palm's phone OS? Where are the Samsung VaporPhones™? Had Palm succeeded in flooding the market with cheap Samsungs, LGs, Sanyos, Sony Ericssons, Motorolas, etc. all running PalmOS they'd be in control again. Instead, we have hardcore Palm users looking to switch to the Sony Ericsson P910 simply because they've given up on Palm's hardware. (Just like PDA users moving to PPC for the same reasons.)

Palm isn't capable of making "great improvements on standard PDA's". That was Sony's job and they did it well. Palm lacks the money, engineering talent, desire and manufacturing ability to create showstoppers like the UX50 or the VZ90. All they can do is keep baby stepping™. Or should I say, "Zen of Palming™"? But, as the saying goes, you can't shine feces (like the Tungsten E) or make a silk purse out of a Zire 31's ear.

Someday they may even incorporate artificial intelligence. But, not all the technology is there yet. It is also imprudent (marketing wise) to offer improvements other than babystep by babystep.

In the near future (one or two years) I expect other improvements in standard PalmOne PDA's as follows:
(1) a sharper (autofocus) lens for the built-in camera,
(2) much larger memory capacity,
(3) built-in voice recognition and,
(4) longer battery life.

Babysteps aren't enough. I think PDAs have been underachieving for years and this is why the market's drying up. Imagine a device with the same form factor as the CLIE UX50, but with:
- 4 inch OLED screen
- Dual SD or Memory Stick and CompactFlash slots
- 5 Mega Pixel camera with video capability
- Voice recorder with voice recognition
- Bluetooth and Wi-Fi
- MP3 player
- 8 hour battery life
- Built in cell phone (GSM and CDMA) radio modules
- 256 MB user-accessible RAM
- USB host ability -> plug in a USB flash drive for extra memory!

This single device could replace PDA, cell phone, laptop, MP3 player, portable video player, digital camera, camcorder, etc.

The UX50 and VZ90 have shown that the technology to do most of these things is either already here or else just around the corner. If Palm's PDAs continue to evolve in a series of "baby steps", pretty soon they'll go the way of the dinosaurs.

That's how I see things. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this!

;-)

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Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.