On August 3rd, Palm’s job board posted an open position for ‘Director – Sprint Retail Sales’. The posting references “the implementation of products/services based on the VP–Sales – Sprint’s direction”, as well as “product launch activities”. These points suggest that Palm will continue its close relationship with Sprint, and, what is more important for us, may soon launch new products!

Back in late April of this year, HP announced the purchase of Palm, Inc. for $1.2 billion. The promising partnership combines HP’s large international infrastructure and resources with Palm’s proven webOS operating system. Perhaps the HP-Palm power-couple, with the help of Sprint’s growing 4G network, can stand against the Android OS’ burgeoning market share. Time will tell.
source: Palm Job Board via PreCentral

While Germany’s O2 is the only carrier to officially offer the webOS 1.4.5 upgrade to its customers, and AT&T owners will probably be the last to receive it, a self-proclaimed “Sprint employee” tells the PreCentral forum that webOS 1.4.5.1 will be available from Sprint on July 7th after most European carriers will have already made 1.4.5 available to customers. On the Palm site, it does let us know what changes to expect from this download, mostly some repairs to minor problems. On the browser, for example, if you enter text on certain web pages, the screen focus now will remain on the text being entered. The upgrade will also correct a rare problem that prevented some podcasts from downloading correctly and addresses several security issues with the software. The forum writing “Sprint employee” also dropped a few more items that the upgrade will bring to Sprint users such as fixing the e-mail so that the Sprint branded e-mail default signature is correctly branded. There will be some improvement to battery life and videos will be able to get sent via multimedia messaging. Sprint TV will have a couple of changes with an upgrade to version 3.5.4 and parental controls will be enhanced. Meanwhile, Palm has made the webOS 1.4.5 SDK available to all developers including the just out of beta PDK. The upgrade will allow 3D gaming PDK apps to be supported by the Palm Pixi.
source: PreCentralForums, Phonescoop

With a launch expected for later this summer, the training model of the Palm Pre Plus is expected to reach AT&T today. The model will be used off the sales floor to train reps, but when training is complete, the model becomes a live store display. With things starting to move rapidly, it could be that the carrier will be ready to offer the webOS flavored model a bit earlier than thought. The faster the distribution of the Pre Plus widens, the better the chances are that Palm could generate enough cash flow to stay alive. Speaking of cash, there is no word on how much AT&T plans on selling the phone for.
source: EngadgetMobile

Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein reportedly released a memo on Tuesday that seemed to announce a shift from the webOS platform to Android. The memo was supposed to be up on Wikileaks at midnight, which it never was. The important part of the memo reads, “While Palm is incredibly proud of our engineers who spent timeless work and effort to bring us this advanced operating system,consumers simply have not caught on. To provide a better future for ourselves and customers, the only logical choice is to transition our hardware and software to the Android platform.” According to Wired’s Gadget Lab and Engadget, a source inside Palm says that there is no plan to switch to Android and that the company is committed to webOS.

There is no question that Android is hot at the moment. Even Rubinstein said that the DROID’s launch at Verizon before the Pre Plus was one of the reasons why his phone is selling poorly at Big Red. But there are things that Palm can do with its OS. Considering that many analysts who hated the hardware of the two phones love the OS, Palm could license webOS to another company who can make superior handsets. Whatever move Palm makes-and time is running out-dumping their home grown OS for the same software everyone else is using seems unlikely.
source: Slashdot via GadgetLab and Engadget

Things are not going well for Palm. It’s hard to believe that when the Pre was introduced last year, things looked so promising for the manufacturer. Now, the stock is down to $4, the Pre and Pixi have been flops at Sprint, enhanced versions of both failed to sell at Verizon despite high hopes, and AT&T is having problems while testing the pair of webOS phones for its network. So, you ask, what else can go wrong? How about Verizon deciding to pull the plug on promoting the Pre? According to the Examiner, Big Red will stop promoting the Pre at the end of the month. The site’s tipster says people are coming into Verizon stores with the Pre in mind, but are flipped to the Android flavored Motorola DROID by reps. In L.A., industry analyst Paul Mueller blames several defective Palm units for some of the problem. Mueller says, “When a device gets returned, people hear about it. It may  not be publicized in the media, but word-of mouth is powerful.”  But there is no question that the DROID has taken many possible sales away from the Palm units. With a much larger hi-res screen, many more apps available, solid construction and the free turn-by-turn navigation, the Android device has become Verizon’s flagship model. The carrier’s initial spots for the Pre focused on how the smartphone was perfect for “Mom” and the gender specific ads might also have been part of the problem. By the time Big Red changed the focus of the campaign, it was already too late. So now what ELSE can happen to Palm?
source: Examiner

As we’ve seen ushered by many analysts and people familiar with the industry, it seems like everyone is unanimous in seeing Palm release a new handset to combat their struggling woes. After their stock had been downgraded and expectations were not in line with their recent Verizon launch, it appears as though Palm might once again partner with Sprint in releasing their latest handset. Sprint of course already beat everyone to the punch in the 4G race by having their next generation network up and running in a handful of markets already, but some analysts see the idea as being risky – claiming that Palm wouldn’t throw all of its eggs in one basket when it comes to the future and embrace of the WiMAX network. Instead, analyst would rather see them update their existing 3G enabled handsets with larger touchscreens and focus on moving its distribution towards AT&T as a potential game saving move. Aside from the hardware aspect, it may also seem that Palm will really need to focus on their webOS platform and tweak it enough to make the experience seamless and innovative. With so many new mobile platforms expected to hit the market, Palm will need to revamp its own platform and keep it fresh enough to be adopted by new customers.
source: Computerworld via BGR

In the US, Sprint Palm Pre owners are getting the first taste of the latest version of the platform while the O2 and Movistar variants are also getting in on this treatment. The download itself is at a mere 39MB and will be all that stands in between your way from getting video recording, Flash, enhanced message notifications, and improved battery life that’s all found on webOS 1.4. Everyone else will have to eye these owners with envy as they will become the first to test out these new features. As they prepare to launch the update on other carriers and handsets, it’ll be a test to see how quickly Palm can expedite the roll out of their next installment of the platform as things have begun to look shaky for the company. They’ll need to really capture the attention of consumers if and when they release the next version in order to compete in this ever fierce market.
via Engadget

After Palm reported to Wall Street that sales performance of their new webOS-based smartphones was far below original expectations, CEO Jon Rubinstein sent an email to all Palm employees explaining in more detail the reasons for their disappointing financial results and the steps the company is taking to right the ship. Below is the text of the actual memo as posted by the Wall Street Journal:

Team,

This morning we announced preliminary results for our 2010 third quarter. Since the quarter has not yet closed, it is too soon to offer exact numbers, but we stated that we expect to report revenues for Q3 between $300 and $320 million. We also announced that we expect our revenue for this fiscal year to fall below the guidance we gave to Wall Street, which ranged from $1.6 to $1.8 billion. As we mentioned in our press release, our softer than expected performance is due to slower than expected customer adoption of our products, which in turn has prompted our U.S. carrier partners to put additional orders on hold for the time being. On a positive note, we expect to exit the quarter with over $500 million in cash on our balance sheet. We’re scheduled to announce our full financial results in March.

I realize this news is difficult to swallow. We made this announcement today to prevent a surprise for Wall Street when we announce quarterly earnings in March. In the meantime, the entire executive team has been working extremely hard to improve product performance, and have implemented a number of initiatives to increase awareness and drive sales.

Dave Whalen and I just returned from a very successful meeting with Verizon Wireless, where they acknowledged that their execution of our launch was below expectations and recommitted to working with us to improve sales. To accelerate sales, we initiated Project JumpStart nearly three weeks ago. Since then, nearly two hundred Palm Brand Ambassadors, supplemented by Palm employees from Sunnyvale, have been training Verizon sales reps across the U.S. on our products. Early results from the stores have already shown improvement on product knowledge and sales week over week. You may have also seen a growing number of Palm ads on billboards, bus shelters, buses, and subway stations—all getting the word out about Palm.

All of these efforts are examples of how we are working to accelerate adoption and grow distribution of webOS. In the next few weeks, your management will work with you to make sure your priorities are laser-focused, primarily on helping to increase sales, improve product quality and differentiate the Palm product experience.

Our goals are taking longer than expected to achieve, but I am still confident that our talented team has what it takes to get the job done.

We’ll schedule an all-hands meeting after our earnings announcement in March, and I’ll be happy to answer your questions.

Go team!!!

jon

Palm has bet it all on the success of webOS and their Palm Pre and Pixi, recently adding Verizon and, hopefully soon, AT&T. Sales on both Sprint and Verizon networks has been disappointing and they will be competing with the likes of the iPhone on AT&T’s network, so hopefully they can pull a rabbit out of their hat and once again become a major player in an already crowded field of smartphones. Do you think Rubinstein’s email inspires confidence?

source: WSJ

It’s unclear if Palm’s recent announcement about lowering its fiscal year 2010 guidance had a play in Sprint lowering the price of the Palm Pixi to $49.99. Since its release with the number three wireless provider, the Palm Pixi stayed in the $99.99 price boat for a while – it was considered by many to be too high and would not garner the attention it needed at that level. When Verizon came along and introduced the Palm Pixi Plus to their webOS starved customers, they managed to offer their version at the same price – but it housed a bit more features to justify a better purchase decision than Sprint’s version. Maybe this might be an attempt to really get people to take notice now – it should’ve probably been like that from the beginning. Some argued that the original $99.99 price of the Pixi really made customers consider to upgrade to the Palm Pre which was priced at $149.99. For all we know, this move by Sprint could spell some other ominous feeling that lurks behind the walls over at Palm – or maybe it could reinvigorate sales that could potentially lead to some serious profit.
source: Sprint via PalmInfocenter

It’s the middle of the day and in the back of your mind, you have that nagging suspicion that you forgot to do something. Suddenly, it hits you. You forgot to tape the new episode of Law and Order and you know that you want to see where this week’s body is discovered. You could call the cleaning lady-but it’s her day off. Wait, you gave a set of your keys to that odd old guy across the hall. Forget it. He’s in the Bronx House of Detentions for the rest of the month. What can you do? Recently, an app was added to the Android Market that allowed for remote setting of a DirecTV DVR over an Android phone. But, as luck would have it, you have a webOS device. Good news at last! The webOS App Catalog has now added the DirecTV DVR schedule app and it is free. The one catch is that you have to have the specific set top box that will allow you to schedule your DVR from your Pre or Pixi (Plus models, too). The models that work are the DirecTV Plus DVR (models R15, R16, R22), DirecTV Plus HD DVR (models HR20, HR21, HR23) or TiVo Series 2 receivers with 6.4a software registered to DirecTV.com. The app will work on Wi-Fi, 3G or EDGE. So if you’re a DirecTV customer with the appropriate box and a webOS phone, start taping your favorite shows from just about everywhere.
source: DirecTV via Engadget