Even though the jury is still out on the overall success of the Pre (hey, it’s early in the game here), and even though Palm has announced a loss of another $100 million (chump change when “trillion” is thrown around so casually), Wall Street likes what they see and Palm stock jumped up more than 16% yesterday and today. Perhaps there will be even more positive stock performance when the Eos is released? Good job, Palm. Let’s keep that blue line moving up and up so that we can all plan on great Palm products for years to come.

Source: Palm Infocenter

Competition: it’s what the free marketplace thrives on and usually results in a big win for the consumer. Sprint and Palm appear to be more than willing to take up the mantle of David and sling some well-aimed stones at the Goliath of AT&T and the iPhone.

In an ad posted on Sprint’s Facebook page, Sprint pulls no punches in pointing out a few advantages with joining their carrier and taking home a Palm Pre: 1) running multiple apps at the same time, 2) real-time updates, 3) save $1200 over two years with their aggressive calling/data plans, and 4) the first 4G network in the wings. Note also the timeliness of this advertising – going after the original iPhone customers now that their 2-year contract is up.

Keep swinging, Sprint and Palm. After all, you won’t land every punch, but you only land a punch if you are swinging away.

Yes, AT&T has the iPhone exclusively in the U.S. However, there are many AT&T subscribers far and wide that are salivating over the Pre but are not making the jump to Sprint to get it. The ever-present and non-stop rumor mill has already churned out the Palm Eos, code-named “Pixie”, a super-thin webOS device with full QWERTY physical keyboard and suggested to cost a paltry $99 (subsidized). Given the 8GB iPhone has been slashed to $99 as well, the Eos may just be the thing to cause AT&T subscribers and possibly a slew of new customers to open their wallets and purses to enjoy Palm’s new Synergy experience instead.

When will (or could) this happen? According to RBC Capital markets analyst Mike Abrahmsky, sometime later this year. Although Sprint has exclusivity on the Pre, that doesn’t necessarily mean they corner the market on webOS if Palm launches a non-Pre webOS handset on a different carrier. At $99, does the Palm Eos entice you?

Source: everythingpre

It is estimated that about 150,000 Palm Pre units have been sold to date, as we said yesterday. However, it looks like these guys just can’t help but install new applications on their webOS-powered smartphones. According to New York-based mobile analytics company Medialets, the users have already downloaded a total of one million apps from Palm’s App Catalog. That figure really sounds like a lot, especially having in mind there are only 30 apps currently available on the storefront (all of which are free). That said, we certainly hope to see more and more mobile programs surface on App Catalog soon enough.

via

Sprint has thumped their chest and announced that there will continue to be shortages of the Pre as consumers seek this smartphone out. Even though weekly shipments are increasing, there is still a backlog of subscribers that want their Pre smartphone.

Sprint CFO Bob Brust indicated that Sprint is catching up with the Pre order backlog and added that the new iPhone 3G S launch the week after the Pre’s launch has had no significant effect on Pre sales. Perhaps this is due in part to Pre sales to current Sprint customers looking to upgrade rather than a flow of new Sprint subscribers, but Mr. Brust claims that there have been plenty of new Sprint customers as a result of the Pre.

Source: Reuters

We alluded to this in a post several days ago – and the New York Times has written about it as well – that the lack of apps in the App Catalog and no access to the webOS SDK (software development kit) by developers is hurting Palm. The longer it takes, the bigger the hurt, so it’s truly in Palm’s best interest to capitalize on the momentum generated by the Pre launch and get more apps in the App Catalog pronto.

When you are competing with the iPhone and it’s behemoth collection of apps (over 50,000 and counting), the only way to fight back is the obvious – more 3rd party apps. Ben Gottlieb of Stand Alone Software, who has made Palm apps since 1995, has switched to making iPhone apps like many other formerly Palm developers. He says, “The WebOS looks like a great comeback, but there’s a little bit of trepidation there. Most Palm OS developers I know have moved over to the iPhone. A lot of us feel abandoned, as the platform was neglected for so many years.”

So Palm, how do you get them back? Hurry up with the SDK release so that developers can develop useful and fun apps for webOS. A healthy developer community equates to more Pre sales. And while you’re at it, get the purchasing system up and running in the App Catalog so the developers can get paid for their efforts. Each day that passes without some progress is lost momentum.

Source: NYTimes.com via Palm Infocenter

In spite of Pre shortages at Sprint stores, Best Buy and the like, the demand appears high enough that analysts like Mark Abramsky of RBC predict sales of as much as 550,000 units by the end of the quarter. This bodes well for Palm given that they are hoping that Pre sales are strong enough to compensate for the reduction in sales of their Windows Mobile Treo devices and their Palm OS handsets like the Centro.

Optimism is running high enough that Abramsky even increased his expectations for Palm’s 2010 and 2011 sales performance, driven mainly by the Pre, from 3.2 – 4.6 million phones up to a range of 4.1 – 6.5 million. Of course, these kinds of figures take into account other carriers likely to sell either the Pre or Eos once Sprint’s exclusivity ends, both in the U.S. and in Europe. Since Palm has placed all their bets on webOS phones at this point, let’s hope these numbers play out. If they do, then Palm’s future is looking better and better.

Source: electronista

Adobe Systems CEO Shantanu Neayen recently announced that a beta of Flash Player 10 beta for smartphones will be available in October and featured at their MAX developer conference. Like Google (Android) and others, Palm is involved in Adobe’s Open Screen Project, an initiative to bring Adobe Flash to all manner of smartphones. This is very good news, particularly in light of the likelihood that the iPhone is nowhere near close to having Flash (and we all know that iPhone has set the standard to be measured by lately, right?). Keep a close eye on the MAX developer conference in October to learn more as the beta is made available to developers.

Source: Palm Infocenter

Right now, the two most talked-about smartphones in the marketplace are the new Palm Pre and the new iPhone 3G S, and it’s impossible to avoid making comparisons. The iPhone is the game-changer that debuted two years ago and the Pre is Palm’s culmination of enduring loads of criticism, rumors of demise, then finally a triumphant launch with a sleek river-stone design and brand new webOS.

An in-depth comparison will be posted soon, but in the meantime, we thought it would be interesting to compare the cold-boot time of the Pre and iPhone 3G S. The Pre was fired up and the Palm logo pulsed rhythmically for a whopping one minute, forty-six seconds (1:46) before it was ready to go. The iPhone 3G S, on the other hand, was a far more speedy 30 seconds (:30) from dead cold to home screen. Patience is a virtue, but hopefully future firmware updates will cut down a bit on the Pre’s boot time. How long does it take for your Pre to fully come to life?

If you’re Palm, how do you respond to Apple’s half-million iPhone 3G S sales weekend? The Palm Pre II? Not quite. In the shadow cast by the next iPhone upgrade, Palm quietly release another firmware update, 1.0.3, which includes several minor updates, like speedier Google syncing, updated Exchange support, improvements to the Clock app, and other miscellaneous updates to apps and general performance.

Don’t get us wrong – we love getting frequent updates and hope they continue to flow. Hopefully in the near future there will be more than just minor updates headed to our Pre smartphones. What about better power management for increased battery life? How about some video? Is there something particular that YOU are looking for?

Source: phone Arena