PalmSource CEO David Nagel Resigns

Posted By: Ryan Monday, May 23, 2005 9:13:23 AM

PalmSource today announced that David Nagel stepped down as president, chief executive officer and director of PalmSource, effective May 22, 2005, and Patrick McVeigh, currently senior vice president, worldwide licensing for PalmSource, has been named interim CEO. The board of directors has initiated a search for a permanent successor. Nagel will remain at PalmSource in an advisory role through mid-July 2005.

"I want to thank Dave for playing an instrumental role in helping position PalmSource to be a major player in the worldwide mobile software market," said Jean-Louis Gassee, chairman of the PalmSource board of directors. "We appreciate that Dave is staying on to ensure a smooth transition and wish him the best in his future ventures."

Nagel, 60, previously served as a member of the board of directors of Palm, Inc. and was named CEO and elected to the board of directors of PalmSource in December 2001. PalmSource was spun off from Palm, Inc. in October 2003, and subsequently completed a public offering in April 2004 and completed the acquisition of China MobileSoft Technologies Ltd., in January 2005.

McVeigh, 53, joined PalmSource in February 2005 as senior vice president of worldwide licensing. McVeigh brings more than 20 years experience in the high technology and consumer electronics industry to PalmSource. He is the former chief executive officer of Aliph Corporation, a developer of next- generation audio and speech technologies for mobile communications devices. Prior to Aliph, he was chairman and CEO of Omnisky Corporation until selling the business to Earthlink. McVeigh was also with the former Palm, Inc. where he was responsible for worldwide sales of all Palm products as well as international marketing and operations. Before joining Palm, McVeigh spent over 10 years with Apple Computer in a variety of sales and marketing positions.

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David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 5/23/2005 8:11:10 AM #

PalmSource CEO David Nagel Steps Down
Monday May 23, 7:43 am ET

David Nagel Steps Down As PalmSource President, Chief Executive Officer for Undisclosed Reasons*

[Translation through Babelfish's Press release -> English translator: "Off the record, that mofo messed us up. Real bad. God help us."]
-----------------------------------------------

*"Undisclosed reasons" my a$$$. How about running the company into the ground for starters. Then there's the Cobalt Catastrophe. Then there's the loss of the most innovative licensee. Then there's the failure to attract any major new licensees in the past four years. Then there's...

McVeigh - who once headed the ill-fated Omnisky - seems to have been given the honor of going down with a sinking ship that was scuttled by Captain "Nero" Nagel. Lucky guy...

I can't wait to see Mike Cane have a seizure when he hears this. Medic!!!

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

Say hello to my little friend...

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Sam H @ 5/23/2005 8:34:02 AM #

Great way to kick off the DevCon...

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

jkirvin @ 5/23/2005 9:34:38 AM #

Oy, when I saw this news this morning I'd forgotten DevCon starts up today, too. Should be interesting...

Gekko Gets His Wish!!

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 9:42:16 AM #

Hey, Nagel, you multiple-OS failing SOB! Will your next posting be at MICROSOFT?! Thanks for HELPING TO KILL A SUCCESSFUL PLATFORM, you rat b*st*rd!

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko @ 5/23/2005 9:45:29 AM #

I think the Board read my posts!

PalmOne -- ABSORB PalmSource NOW

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 9:45:34 AM #

BUY that effing company NOW! Kick out all the frikkin licensees (believe me, they'll be GLAD to be kicked out!). And GET RID OF THE GODDAMMED FRAM IN YOUR NEW DEVICES!

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko @ 5/23/2005 9:46:22 AM #

>"Will your next posting be at MICROSOFT?!"

Are you kidding? They'd NEVER have him.

Nagel's Night of the Long Knife

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 9:54:58 AM #

On Thursday, he was saying: "There is a growing market for open platforms and Linux is a key future player."

http://www.redherring.com/article.aspx?a=12129

On Friday, did they give you the Long Knife?

Let us know if he has the gall to show his face at the DevCon!

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko @ 5/23/2005 9:55:40 AM #

"benamy" will be very happy.

http://www.palminfocenter.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=26283&highlight=&sid=ff8236dda334cfcdc4568d51d57b91cd

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko @ 5/23/2005 9:57:58 AM #

MikeCon - what do you think the chances are of us seeing those 11 (ELEVEN) Cobalt devices in 2005 Nagel promised?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

silkentiger @ 5/23/2005 10:00:39 AM #

Boy, I have to agree with the chorus of "good riddance" in this thread. Hopefully the new PSRC captain will right the sinking ship.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 10:05:03 AM #

HAHAHAHAHA!!! I forgot all about The Famous Eleven!

Watch: There will NO talk of licensees.

NONE!!

PalmOne, BUY THAT DISASTER NOW BEFORE YOU SINK WITH IT!!

Coming Sooner? -- WinMob Treo Life Preserver?

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 10:06:15 AM #

Perhaps THIS is why p1 has been seen flirting with that cheap tart, WinMob, for a Treo? They saw PalmSource going down the drain before their very eyes and knew they'd need a life preserver!

Some "life preserver!"

Better you should do straight Linux!

Nagel replaces Yueh

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 10:09:27 AM #

In the classic novel "Dune," the traitor Yueh becomes a proverb: "A thousand deaths are not enough for Yueh."

Yueh, you've been replaced!!

A THOUSAND DEATHS ARE NOT ENOUGH FOR NAGEL!!

Let's start with ELEVEN!

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 5/23/2005 10:42:17 AM #

I'm tempted to sign up for the DevCon just to see if Nagel shows up to kick off the week with his scheduled Keynote speech on Tuesday...

http://www.palmsource.com/events/devcon2005/agenda_tues.html

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

Say hello to my little friend...

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Scott R @ 5/23/2005 10:49:36 AM #

I think splitting up palmOne and PalmSource was probably a bad move to begin with, but it may be too late for palmOne buying PalmSource to do any good. palmOne's latest efforts aren't that spectacular, IMO (Treo 600 designed by Handspring team was an overall more reliable and zen-like device than my Treo 650).

And then there's Tapwave. Where would that leave them? Ugh.

IMO, PalmSource should have just kept improving on the OS5 architecture and figured out a way to add multitasking support to that rather than spending so much time and money on these Cobalt and Linux endeavors.

http://Tapland.com
- Tapwave Zodiac News, Reviews, & Discussion -

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 5/23/2005 10:59:32 AM #

I think splitting up palmOne and PalmSource was probably a bad move to begin with, but it may be too late for palmOne buying PalmSource to do any good.

Right on both counts. Pure greed was behind the "split". Now it's time to pay the piper (or is it "pay the Reaper"?)

palmOne's latest efforts aren't that spectacular, IMO (Treo 600 designed by Handspring team was an overall more reliable and zen-like device than my Treo 650).

Bingo.

Unfortunately, there's technically NO way for PalmOS 5 to truly multitask. PalmOS has already been stretched FAR beyond what it has any right to do and the cracks are starting to show. Handspring's TreoOS was a stunning hack of a creaky old OS, but further hacking would likely produce such an unstable OS that the whole thing would come down like a deck of cards.

PalmLinux was needed three years ago, but no one at Palm had the guts to commit to it until it was too late. That's the problem with companies full of yesmen like Palm's Apple Dumpling Gang - no one is willing to tell the truth.

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

Say hello to my little friend...

Give Gates a Heart Attack: The Big Merge

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 11:03:25 AM #

Fine! p1 will buy PSource *and* Tapwave, goddammit!

PSource to get control over the OS and to FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY put that effing Garnet out to pasture. And they can use the Tapwave brand to spit out Power User Turbo Products with *REAL RAM*. Let's start with the Zodiac 3: 128MB RealRAM, SDIO slot and CompactFlash slot (with a *real* stylus, *real* stylus silo, and NO damnable TT boingboing stylus!). I'll buy my OWN frikking GBs of memory, thank you!

They can keep their palmOne brand to churn out CrapRAM (TM, VOR) for the Unwashed Masses who get too drunk everyday to recharge at night.

I hope the PSource Board gets sued into sh*t!

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 11:22:33 AM #

WHERE the hell was their OVERSIGHT?! The stock is now ONE-FOURTH of what it was and will probably sink even further, faster.

PalmOne: HOSTILE TAKEOVER! It's the ONLY way to get rid of that goddammed incompetent Board!

Dammit, I *knew* Nagel wasn't All There when he made that moronic statement that POS was good enough to be put on notebooks.

The *second* clue came when *palmOne* (FINALLY!) saw the wisdom in putting in a file manager -- while the PSource Chorus kept insisting on that straitjacket, VFS!

The PPC Weenies must be breaking out the champagne over this.

Apple Uber Alles: Gekko's Nightmare Redux

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 12:17:23 PM #

http://www.itworld.com/Tech/4535/050523palmceo/

>>>Patrick McVeigh, 53, appointed in February as senior vice president, worldwide licensing for PalmSource, was named interim CEO in tandem with the board of directors' search for a permanent successor, it said.

THE KICKER:

>>>Before joining Palm, McVeigh spent over 10 years with Apple Computer Inc. in a variety of sales and marketing positions.

OMG: Is there a Nagel Gene?!!?

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 12:26:08 PM #

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Nagel

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

dagwud @ 5/23/2005 1:30:54 PM #

To quote:

Dammit, I *knew* Nagel wasn't All There when he made that moronic statement that POS was good enough to be put on notebooks.

But it WAS good enough to be put on notebooks. It all depends on your definition of when "was" was. Heh.

Still, if they can come out with a "PalmOne Life" (That's "LifeDrive" minus the drive), they might encourage me to upgrade. After all, it's not a good sign when someone like me stopped upgrading 4 years ago.

--
Palm Pilot Pro -> III -> Vx -> m500 -> m515 -> ???

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Wollombi @ 5/23/2005 2:32:44 PM #

Oh yeah. I can see the advertising now...."Get a Life". =P

_________________
Sean

There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Sam H @ 5/23/2005 3:13:24 PM #

Will your next posting be at MICROSOFT?!

'Jonah' Nagel at Microsoft? We can but dream. ;)

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

dbmoyers2 @ 5/23/2005 5:34:44 PM #

This is funny. Every one of these post is during normal business hours. How many of you people work for a living? Do your managers know what you do during the day? I find this amazing. Interesting too, sense nobody post during lunch, I guess you got off the board long enough to eat.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Surur @ 5/23/2005 5:46:21 PM #

At least they are all gainfully employed, unlike Nagel

Surur

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

dbmoyers2 @ 5/23/2005 5:58:27 PM #

Employed, maybe. Gainfully..not likely. Nagel..retired. Their all fired.."the Donald".

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 6:04:29 PM #

That is the FIRST comment surur has ever posted that made me laugh!

Was benamy behind Nagel's "Retirement"?

Masamune @ 5/23/2005 6:28:18 PM #

I haven't seen the guy post on here for a while - and now Nagel goes....Is there a connection?

What you were saying about PalmOne buying Tapwave - it's not as crazy as it sounds. There was the statement from Tapwave saying that their technology would be put into non-Tapwave devices - you could see that beautiful 128Mb of Zodiac 2 RAM coming to a P1 handheld near you.....

As for the PSRC board, it reminds of something I read in Hitchhikers Guide..."The Guide defines the PSRC board as a bunch of mindless jerks who will be first against the wall when the revolution comes."

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

AdamaDBrown @ 5/23/2005 6:36:08 PM #

Will your next posting be at MICROSOFT?!

Why not? Utter cluelessness, no feel for the market, stumbling from one idea to the next, no idea what customers want, and blindly trying to find something successful? Sounds like the picture of a potential Microsoft executive to me. Just don't stick him in the Windows Mobile division, they've been doing pretty well lately.

Sales Success?

Timothy Rapson @ 5/23/2005 7:52:36 PM #

Would you consider yourself successful if you were CEO of a software company whose highest end new growth product has been 3 years in the making and sold how many copies? ZERO?!
I just hope they didn't pay Nagel a lot of money. They did? Oh, so that is why the LifeDrive cost $500 and both PalmOne and PalmSource are barely making money and often losing money while rapidly losing market share? They meant to spend some money on delivering actual successful products, really they did. But, instead they spent it all on exec pay, percs, and parachutes.
So long Nagel, and probably so long Palm for this increasingly unsatisfied Palm user.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

cbowers @ 5/23/2005 8:16:45 PM #

"How many of you people work for a living? Do your managers know what you do during the day? I find this amazing. "

BTW my employer appreciates your concern and would like your morality police badge number so they can give proper credit.

Gekko: Do the math

mikecane @ 5/23/2005 8:26:52 PM #

Didn't I read somewhere that p1's contract with PSource comes with a *guaranteed* payment of $40M to PS, despite what p1's sales might be?

How much would it cost for p1 to do a hostile takeover of PS at its current stock price?

(Come on, Larry Ellison! Buy them ALL! Make another one of my Predictions come true!)

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko @ 5/23/2005 8:31:28 PM #

PSRC current market cap is about $150M.

Write the check, Con, and she's all yours!

http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=PSRC&d=t

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

AdamaDBrown @ 5/23/2005 8:46:04 PM #

Mike, that's correct. Minimum $40 million a year, regardless of sales or anything else.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Surur @ 5/23/2005 8:47:52 PM #

OR they could save $40 million by switching.

There is such a thing as throwing good money after bad...

Surur

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

svrontis @ 5/24/2005 1:27:55 AM #

Switching? Like Acer, you mean? They got sued for breaching their contract with PalmSource and they had to settle. Worse for them, they switched to a poor-excuse-for an operating system. Aside from all obvious problems with WinCE/PPC/WinMob/whatever, Acer found themselves in the position where the operating system restrictions forced them into making units which were indistinguishable from those sold by players like HP - which meant that, from a marketing perspective, Acer could not hold themselves out as offering a compelling alternative. I don't recall seeing any statistics on how well they have done since their switch, but they seem to be concentrating their efforts on Tablet PCs these days.

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Surur @ 5/24/2005 2:30:27 AM #

You do know you've hit the nail on the head, don't you.

Due to the software platform being the same, Wm OEM's had to compete on hardware features and price. On the POS side they seemed to love adding software extensions which made the various OS's incompatible for apps.

Is there anything special about the Acer version of tablet pc? Or are their devices just lighter and cheaper?

Surur

And I was worried I wouldn't have a new toy to biotch slap!

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 5/24/2005 3:05:05 AM #

Now that BubbaSteve annd Kirvin ran off to their mamas screaming hysterically I was worried no one else would step up and put on the dumba$$ crown. No need to worry - db's here from the dumba$$ temp agency to fill in:

dbmoyers2 @ 5/23/2005 5:34:44 PM

Some of us were off work today. Others ARE the boss and make their own hours. Others are smart enough to know how to multitask. Others have break time when they can do whatever they want to do. I understand this is not the reality for you in Stalag 17, Comrade, but remember: your pathetic reality is not the norm.

P.S. Please learn how to spell. Your cluelessness may be endearing to your Mommy, but it undermines any points you potentially (well... not really) could have made.

Surur @ 5/23/2005 5:46:21 PM

At least they are all gainfully employed, unlike Nagel

Surur

Surur seems to be specializing in savage backhand biotchslaps these days. Nice to see he's not one to kick a bad man when he's down (in Nagel's case, down packing his golden parachute).

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

Say hello to my little friend...

A few juicy nuggets from the start of Palm's DevCon

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 5/24/2005 4:24:08 AM #

Someone somewhere just came back from San Jose where DevCon started today. A few tidbits from the combined PUG meeting:

1) Nagel actually showed up. Looked like a beaten man + tried to sound upbeat. He'll still do part of the keynote speech, Colligan will probably come in to relieve him.

2) Palm is aware of the negative press and their reps must have said 3 or 4 time that rumors of their demise were greatly exaggerated. McDonnell's presentation failed to back up that claim.

3) PDA geek women are hideous.

4) PalmGear's Kenny West leaves an oil slick everywhere he slithers.

5) PDA geek men are hideous. And the local rep from the San Francisco PUG was the caricature of a PDA nerd. Scary.

6) Aceeca's Kiwi reps were the only cool reps in the house.

7) Bombshell: The Tungsten C is officially DEAD. No replacement. Palm feels the LifeDrive is its replacement!

8) Get 20% off at Handango at palm.handango.com

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

Say hello to my little friend...

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PalmSource CEO David Nagel Resigns

Article Comments

David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko Gets His Wish!!

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

PalmOne -- ABSORB PalmSource **NOW**

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Nagel's Night of the Long Knife

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Coming Sooner? -- WinMob Treo Life Preserver?

Nagel replaces Yueh

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Give Gates a Heart Attack: The Big Merge

I hope the PSource Board gets sued into sh*t!

Apple Uber Alles: Gekko's Nightmare Redux

OMG: Is there a Nagel Gene?!!?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Was benamy behind Nagel's "Retirement"?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Sales Success?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

Gekko: Do the math

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

RE: David Nagel leaving PalmSource. Too late to matter?

And I was worried I wouldn't have a new toy to biotch slap!

A few juicy nuggets from the start of Palm's DevCon

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