Motorola Cancels Palm-Based Smartphone

Motorola has dropped plans to produce a Palm OS-based smartphone, according to a report in The Register. They cited only an anonymous Motorola executive who said that the device was "extremely unlikely" ever to reach market. The company had poor earnings last year and has begun cutbacks. In January, they cancelled their plans to produce a smartphone that ran the Symbian OS.

Back in September, Palm and Motorola announced that they would collaborate in creating a tri-band GSM smartphone. The companies said at the time the device would contain a color screen, include Palm's HotSync and over-the-air synchronization using Motorola's Starfish TrueSync software, and feature General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) compatibility.

John Thode, Motorola's VP and General Manager of smartphone products, said at the recent GSM World Congress that Motorola viewed the Palm device as a research project. "We had fifty products on our roadmap, with several competing against each other in the same market segments," Thode said. "That's commercial suicide." The Palm OS was not considered powerful enough despite Palm's high brand value in the United States.

While not good news, with a Palm-based smartphone already on the market from Kyocera and another from Samsung scheduled for release this Summer, it isn't the end of the world.

Related Articles:

• Motorola to Release Palm-Based Smartphone in 2002
• Motorola Reports Weak Earnings

On the Web:

• Motorola to axe Palm smartphone

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