Sony to Suspend Clie Handheld Line

This is bad news for PalmSource, yes, not necessarily for PalmOne. Losing a licensee just prior to introducing a new OS to the market is not exactly good PR. This effectively leaves the PalmOS market to PalmOne. (Not taking into account the smaller licensees like Garmin and TapWave, whose combined market share must be minuscule.)

That said, Sony has been losing market share steadily over the last few years, so this decision doesn't exactly come out of the blue. What *is* surprising is that they've kept releasing new units this long. (The TH55 is not a bad device at all, actually.)

The only way I see Sony coming back in the PalmOS fold is through them releasing OS5-powered SmartPhones. Now that would be a major coup for PalmSource.

There's a well-known marketing law which states that a market will eventually be dominated by two players, and it certainly holds in this case. (I.e. PalmOne and HP.)

More than just bad news. You might say it is death blow. We're back to 1996 where only one Palm handheld maker exists. Not counting Tapwave of course because they are subset of the PDA market.

Unless PalmSource can quickly sign on a strong new licensee...Microsoft and it's throng of PPC vendors will fill the void left by Sony, and take a COMMANDING lead in the handheld market.

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Contributing Editor, http://digitalmediathoughts.com
Editor, http://Pocketfactory.com

Are you saying Dull...er, I mean Dell doesn't count as a major force? ;-)

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Contributing Editor, http://digitalmediathoughts.com
Editor, http://Pocketfactory.com

PSRC taking it on the chin over at the Naz! Down about 15% with an ugly looking chart since the announcement. Uggh.

Pat Horne; www.churchoflivingfaith.com

Everyone is forcasting the unknown.

Sony is not the end of PalmSource. PalmOne is so successful because PalmSource has such a successful OS that runs America's most successful connected PDA, the Treo 600.

The question is has Sony been exceeding its minimum royalty payments with its losing marketshare with the Clie line?

The next question is if Sony has not been exceeding its minimum is it still a licensee and what is its minimum and how is PalmSources profitability going to be effected this coming quarter?

The question is how did todays annoucement effects PSRC profitability or did it???????

It is a disappointment the CLIE line is being dropped just as Cobalt is getting ready to surface but why all the doom and gloom about PSRC. HOW IS IT EFFECTED ON A MONEY BASIS??

Know whose fault this is mainly, besides the engineers' focus on features that were unnecessary and unwanted? Fansites that do nothing but praise their products, look at the best side of things, never give light to the bad part of the products, and act like everything is peachy-f'ing-****. The fact is that Sony should have been SCORNED LIKE HELL by all sites like they were here for dropping Bluetooth in many US models. They should have been scolded harder for waiting so long to release a non-clamshell model with HVGA. They should have been urinated all over for keeping with their incredibly slow HHE and miniscule RAM, which couldn't even give the original Pilot 1000 penis envy. I am absolutely furious and thoroughly disgusted with both Sony's R&D department with how they didn't understand the market craved FULLY WORKING DUAL SLOTS, a fast processor, dual wireless, an abundant amount of memory, and acceptable battery life, as well as the same amount of fury and disgust with the sites that praised them (and quite highly, at that, this site not being one of them) for delivering overpriced, underfeatured products. I simply cannot stress enough how annoyed I am with this situation. Absolutely killer for Sony (bad PR to look uncertain), PalmSource (losing almost half your revenue), AND PalmOne (leaving the marketshare to be further divided AGAINST yours, putting you in a position with less consumer and developer support behind the OS you run).

-Bosco
NX80v + Wifi + BT + T616

I should note that I've also owned two Handsprings and three Sony units, all of which worked perfectly (and all but one of which was passed off to a relative and is still in use).

But PalmOne is just a joke. IMO the people who design their hardware have a lot of good ideas, but either the designs just aren't reliable, or they're being built too cheap. It's gotten to the point where Palm's static/USB dying problem on the old M5xx line looks like "the good old days".

STILL NO ONE HAS ANSWER THE QUESTION OF HOW THIS WILL EFFECT PSRC BOTTOM LINE?!

WAS SONY EXCEEDING ITS MIMIMUM ROYALTY PAYMENT THIS PAST QUARTER?

UZ14U182 scolded me for saying Sony DROPPED the CLIE line because Sony SUSPENDED the CLIE line. Who cares buddy!

The issue is how is this going to effect the heart and soul of the Palm line and the Palm line is the OS that Palmsource makes not the hardware by any company. The only thing that is going to effect the Palm OS is if PSRC can not make at least break even profitability.

So again--How is this going to effect PSRC profits?

Has anyone ever read any information that they can post that shows Sony's licensee agreement. PSRC has quoted portions of PLMO agreement. Does anyone have that info for Sony from PSRC?

If they're taking a short break to start coming out with PDAs designed for the US, THAT would rock. Sony's current Clie's are just weird and uncomfortable. Unfortunately, I seriously doubt that we'll ever see another Clie in the US.

I'm so tired of all this “smartphone” garbage. To begin with, there aren’t very many “smartphones” sold in the United States. And while in theory it sounds nifty to combine a phone and a PDA, the realtiy so far as stunk. The form factors are just too different. I’d need something that looked and acted like a normal PDA, but was also a phone. So far all the phone/PDA combos are too small to be good PDAs (and usually have keyboards on them), and awkward for phones. On top of that, the prices for the things are hideous. They always cost MORE than a good high-end PDA and high-end phone combined, and aren’t as good as either.

>>>Taking a short break? Dear God are you in denial or what? ;-)

Be kind. He does not know that when Japanese say "Reassess," they *really* mean "Cut our losses and run like hell."

Stupid Americans think "Hai" means "Yes." Bakkayaro!

Well...

It has been a while since I have posted any remarks, but have been lurking on PIC regularly...

It's sad to see the Clie's go, I had been one of sony's stongest supporter a few years back.

Ahh... those good old days, I used to be very critical of Palm's lack of innovations, and praised Sony on their aggressiveness with their product line. Remember the days?...low-res vs. high-res, mp3 players, color vs. monochrome...

Anyway, I guess where Sony loss me was when they kept the max internal memory at 16 mb's for the longest time and the max memory stick limit of 128mb. I abandoned my clie and switched to the Tungsten C, after Sony annouced the TG, then the NX/NZ series, and finally the UX series with still 16 mb's of internal memory.

KAY

Yes, those chicken bones never fail me.

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Contributing Editor, http://digitalmediathoughts.com
Editor, http://Pocketfactory.com

Since Sony owns shares in Symbian through its shared ownership of SonyEricsson, it makes more sense for it to push Symbian OS much more than Palm. As a shareholder it benifits much more from Symbian being strong than it does from PalmSource doing well.

The P900 has sold very well and its a great phone. If Sony continues knocking out phones like this the PDA market willdie a death very soon.

It would be very hard to call this a bad move without knowing more. At the very least, it frees Sony from having to license the PalmOS. Given that Sony has more than one other OS possibility for future devices, that may not be a big loss from Sony's point of view. Also, the PDA market in general looks much weaker than it did a couple of years ago, at least for general consumer use. The trend seems to show people using their phone more and more for traditional PDA functions. Most people also have an iPod or other music player and many have at least one device that can take a picture. Against all that, the Clie was seeming a bit redundant.

Also, it's hard to know where Sony was really going with this thing. Everybody loved the T series from a couple of years ago and thought it would be quickly followed by something just like it but with virtual graffiti. Instead, they followed with some unusual devices that didn't seem to be targeted at anyone in particular.

I think this does spell doom for PalmSource, but not for another year or so. And who cares, really?

elo

The Best Buy PDA section "looking sad" is undoubtedly an example of the reason SONY is dropping PDAs.

Indeed - there are those who are confusing the "sectors" of PDAs and phones and making unsupported statements about, for example, PalmOne "beating" Sony in the PDA sector when they're using phone sector information to support their incorrect statement!

The PDA sector hasn't just been shrinking, it's been shrinking DRAMATICALLY - PalmOne itself said they had something like a 20+% dropoff from one year to the next:

-- http://messages.yahoo.com/bbs?action=m&board=1607137051&tid=plmo&mid=12165&sid=1607137051

Sony is abandoning that sector NOT because they were "beat" by anyone but because the sector itself is dead. I wonder how the last buggy whip manufacturer discussed their performance:

== "Yes, we had a dramatic increase in marketshare
== when OldHoss Buggy Accessories decided to concentrate
== on that Ford contraption."

...

>>>I still use my Betamax for taping

Only because the institution you are in could never afford VHS. Your meds task their budget.

Poor Sphincterface. Good thing your mother (whoever she was) couldn't find that coat hanger in time. We would have been spared your hysterical rantings every time you escape from the grounds. You know all about psychomeds. They've tried every one on you. You're a tough nut to crack.