HP has had it’s ups and downs, even while being the largest PC seller. It’s ventures into mobile business have met many a rock and hurdle. The acquisition of Palm OS to help them scale well into the mobile phone business didn’t have good results. Even the idea to open-source it there-after was met with no developer and partner support, something that is quite vital in the adoption of a mobile platform by users.
PC sales are on a decline with the money going to smartphones and tablets. These are growing by leaps and bounds as the price ever goes down while functionality goes up to meet the PC.
HP is quoted as saying they are in plans to get back to the smartphones race and that they will be launching a device that will offer a “differentiated experience” to customers. This is by HP Senior Director of Consumer PC and Media Tablets in Asia Pacific Yam Su Yin where he said HP will be spreading it’s tentacles across all segments including tablet PCs, Notebook PCs as well as all-in-ones (AIOs). Yin did confirm that indeed HP has plans to get back to smartphones without giving a time-line. He said that HP has to be in the game and that it would be silly if they said no to smartphones.
HP suggests going with other smaller Operating systems other than Android in-order to separate itself from the mass market. Other smaller OS-es could mean either Windows Phone to blend in with their other devices or others like Firefox OS phone and Ubuntu OS.
“Being late you have to create a different set of proposition. There are still things that can be done. Its not late. When HP has a smartphone, it will give a differentiated experience.” Yam Su Yin added.
Critics and bloggers say that Palm OS was indeed a great OS, but other factors like attracting developers and partners led to it’s slow death. This leads me to wonder why HP would again want to venture into an untested OS that is bound to have them remain in oblivion.
