I’m wondering if Palm has a future – given the intense competition in the smartphone market.  There was a rumor they were shutting down production but I still wonder about the long term.  I’ve been a long term Palm user – back to the Handspring day so I’m actually a fan.  I’ve been using some Palm apps for quite a few years – and was an original fan of “Grafitti”   I’ve been thinking about upgrading from my Palm Centro to a Palm Pre for a while -but am wondering if that’s a good long term strategy.

The Palm Pre looked like a potential iPhone killer – but seems to have fallen pretty flat.  I like the idea of multi-tasking, support for my legacy Palm apps, and a newer screen.  What concerns me is the long-term potential of Palm – whether they’ll be around for the future.

There are 2 main competitors that may be the death knell for Palm:

  1. Google’s Android OS – shortly after the Palm Pre came out Google’s Android operating system seem to have taken off.  You have the Droid, the Nexus One and a growing host of phones coming out on multiple carriers based on this OS.    There’s a whole set of apps being created for  this platform.
  2. Windows Phone 7 Series – just when I had about written off Microsoft as a real player in the smartphone market (as Android and iPhone seemed to be duking it out) they announce a redesigned OS.  This looks pretty impressive and likely to take even more attention away from Palm.

So we now have little Palm going up against Apple, Google and Microsoft – I don’t think this looks good for them.  Palm has always been a company that flirted with bankruptcy -so I don’t know how much time they have left.  I may still upgrade to a Pre if it makes financial sense – but I not so enthusiastic about it as before.

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