palmOne Closes Shanghai Office

palmOne has closed a representative office in Shanghai, China. The company has also temporarily withdrawn from the Chinese handheld market.

An article on Forbes.com points to statements made by a person with palmOne's operations in China. On October 25th the company shut down a palmOne office in Shanghai. The article also goes into some detail about how palmOne and Chinese manufacturers have faired with Palm OS devices in China.

The article states Chinese manufacturers such as Lenovo, Founder, and Acer Computer also said that their cooperation with palmOne had already stopped. And that palmOne's frustration in China had something to do with its unfavorable cooperation with Chinese manufacturers. It goes on to talk about the results that Acer, Lenovo and Founder have had in the Chinese PDA market, which has not been an easy market to break into.

Lenovo expressed intent to team up with Palm as early as in 2000, but it did not obtain the authorization of Palm until December 2002. However, competitions in the Chinese PDA market had been extremely fierce at that time, and most PDA manufacturers adopted Microsoft's WomCE operating system. As a partner of Microsoft, Lenovo just took the cooperation with Palm as way of containing Microsoft.

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temporarily?

JarJar @ 11/10/2004 12:42:23 PM #
It is pretty obvious what "temporary" means.

A good spanking for PalmOne

RhinoSteve @ 11/10/2004 12:51:21 PM #
Ok PalmOne, so you are not as big as you though you were! You are are the golden child of a Silicon Valley success and you though you could take on the world. Guess again!

The Valley is a good place to start up a new idea but when it comes down to hard margins, volume and distribution deals, there are to many at PalmOne's helm that are still sipping their latte's on University Avenue in Palo Alto as they try to think of an ideal world.

Frankly, this is the butt kicking that PalmOne needed to have them set their game straight. Lick the wounds, move on, get a Palm OS 6 out the door and quit resting on your laurels!
RE: A good spanking for PalmOne
GearHead @ 11/10/2004 8:33:09 PM #
I totally agree with you! This was a well deserved warning for Palm, that theey should get their act together.

I think Palm should quit making handhleds. Focus on developing an OS platform which can be adapted on current awsome PPC hardware. I love the PPC hardware, but PPC OS doesn't feel right, no matter what. Imagine a Dell X30 or Dell V50 with Palm OS 6...

I wish they make a Treo with the specs below:

Such as 624 mHz, BT+Wi-Fi+Quad Band GSM

This is my dream machine I guess...

Cheers...

Palm III>Palm IIIx>PalmV>PalmVx>Palm m505>Palm M515>Tungsten T
Dell X30 624Mhz w/BT+Wi-Fi
Nokia 6600 w/BT

RE: A good paddling with leather + chains for PalmOne
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/10/2004 9:50:39 PM #
I think Palm should quit making handhleds. Focus on developing an OS platform which can be adapted on current awsome PPC hardware.

Don't you believe that Palm is now two different companies?

PalmSource made something like $10 million from licencing PalmOS last quarter. And I believe if you total all their income + expenses, they still managed to lose money for the quarter. Do you really think they will ever make any significant profits as a PDA OS company? Not unless their OS was to get included in a decent percentage of the millions of cheap cellphones being sold around the world. At $10 a pop, it's gonna take a lot more sales to make PalmSource a stable, independent company.

Pa1m0n3's revenues for the same quarter were around $270 million, and they're now making more per PDA than they have in quite a while. Do you still feel they should stop making PDAs?

Palm could easily get the same companies that make PPC hardware to make Palm hardware. If Palm wanted to. But for years, their beancounters have been recommending the cheapest construction they can get away with, in an effort to maximize profits. Now this strategy has turned around and bitten Palm in the a$$. The problem is, once you lose momentum in this market, it's hard to recover.

Palm needs to:
1) Focus on quality control - it needs better contract manufacturers, better parts quality and better after sales support. C r a p p y QC is driving Palm's reputation into the toilet. So much for the good Palm name.
2) Focus on saturating the market with high profit Treos - playing the "shortage" of units game when the Treo 650 is launched would be just plain silly.
3) Pare down its offerings to just 2 (or at max 3) traditional PDAs and add a stripped down Treo (priced less than $200 with contract).

No more BS, Palm. PPC smells blood, and Palm's looking like it's ready to get Netscaped. Funny how no one ever believes how fast former market leaders can fall. Until you wake up one morning and they're gone.




******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

Death Spiral

Gekko @ 11/10/2004 1:04:17 PM #

"Death can come swiftly to a market leader. By the time you have lost the positive-feedback cycle it's often too late to change what you've been doing, and all of the elements of a negative spiral come into play." - Bill Gates, "The Road Ahead", Chapter 3



PalmX is dead

Mausoleum @ 11/10/2004 2:39:59 PM #
I think the Palm franchise is in a similar position as Arafat: basically dead, but noone wants to admit it and everyone's hoping for a miracle. Hopefully next year PalmX is going to refute me by quoting Mark Twain: "The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.", but right now, I am just going to cry myself to sleep and will hope that Linux-on-pda is useable. I heard XStroke is like Graffiti 1... that's already one advantage over current Palm OS 8-). I've used PPC over the summer extensively on a top-of-the line PDA (400Mhz XScale, 128MB Ram, PPC2003, WiFi + BT) and it was atrocious. So once PalmOS is gone, Linux will be the only choice...

Please let this be a nighmare from which I can wake up to a kick-ass Palm OS 6.1 device? But somehow I think Palm OS 6 is super-borged, otherwise we'd all have a choice between a T|E 2 (no slider plastic case and no vibration (sound familiar)) and a T|T5 running OS 6 with metal slider case and vibrating alarm) by now.

MST


RE: ....So is the PDA industry
Foo Fighter @ 11/10/2004 3:02:40 PM #
>> "So once PalmOS is gone, Linux will be the only choice..."

If that were the case the PDA market would die along with Palm because Linux is even worse than Windows Mobile. Frankly much of this "atrocious" Pocket PC experience described by people here can be attributed simple platform bias. Just look at the numbers; HP is is rivals PalmOne. Do you think consumers buying all these iPaq have done so with a gun pointed at their heads? They're buying them by choice, and that says a lot about how the average consumer differs from PDA geeks who hang around enthusiast web sites.

I use PalmOS and PPC hardware and find each to be as worthy/unworthy choices as the next mobile device. In fact, the Tungsten T5 currently holds to record for most bugs I've ever encountered on a mobile device. The same holds true with personal computers; of which I own both Mac and PC. Each has it's own idiosyncrasies and utility.



-------------------------------
Editor, http://Pocketfactory.com
Contributing Editor, http://digitalmediathoughts.com

...huh?
Lucky Bob @ 11/12/2004 2:09:56 PM #
"I think the Palm franchise is in a similar position as Arafat: basically dead, but noone wants to admit it and everyone's hoping for a miracle."

Who is this "everyone?" The only people that are sad Arafat is gone are the Palestinians and the liberal media. The guy was pretty much a terrorist...

(Why do some people say you can kill two birds with one stone when it's hard enough killing one bird with two stones?)

What a screwy article

Michael Mace @ 11/10/2004 2:54:48 PM #
Wow, this is one of the most muddled articles I've read in a long time. Setting aside the inventive renaming of Windows CE to "WomCE," it's full of misinterpretations about what's going on in China. It doesn't even mention our most successful Chinese licensee, GSPDA, whose Palm OS smartphones are selling quite well in Asia.

I can't comment on anything specific about palmOne, but I can assure you that PalmSource has a strong and growing commitment to the Chinese market.

Mike
CCO, PalmSource Inc.

RE: What a screwy article
Gekko @ 11/10/2004 3:06:35 PM #

"There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!"



Time for some damage control. Let's trot out our old pal...
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/10/2004 3:54:16 PM #
http://tinyurl.com/6lhzs



******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What a screwy article
just_little_me @ 11/10/2004 4:22:19 PM #
You are such an idiot Voice... unbelievably so... did you actually read what Michael said? He said he couldn't comment at all on palmOne in China, but simply confirmed that Palmsource were still active there. He also mentioned tha tthe article was messed up - which is obviously the case...


JLM.

RE: What a screwy article
LiveFaith @ 11/10/2004 5:02:28 PM #
Michael,

Thanks for the vote of confidence. We need encouragement around here right now. With what P1 has offered as high end, I think has the Palm sheep very nervous. We are hoping that the true high-end Palms are in the wings, albeit delayed. But negative news seems to be winning the days and weeks lately concerning the power users (OS6 & P1).
If Palm vendors cede the high-end to the dark-side, then we know that the end is just a formality. Thanks again.

Pat Horne; www.churchoflivingfaith.com

RE: What a screwy article
mikecane @ 11/10/2004 6:07:55 PM #
>>>"There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!"

Stop stealing my lines!!

So, PalmSource is doing fine.

We haven't yet questioned that (unless there are *less* than 11 licensees out with stuff **here in the States** next year, Mace!).

It's palmOne that is, to paraphrase an above post, "Arafat-like."

RE: What a screwy article
EdH @ 11/10/2004 6:42:47 PM #
>Thanks for the vote of confidence.

>We need encouragement...

>...I think has the Palm sheep very nervous.

>We are hoping...

Anyone for a round of Kumbaya?


RE: What an honest, embarassing article
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/10/2004 10:36:34 PM #
Anyone for a round of Kumbaya?

Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya
Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya
Someone's crying, Lord, kumbaya
Oh Lord, kumbaya



******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What an honest, embarassing article
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/10/2004 10:48:12 PM #
Wow, this is one of the most muddled articles I've read in a long time. Setting aside the inventive renaming of Windows CE to "WomCE," it's full of misinterpretations about what's going on in China. It doesn't even mention our most successful Chinese licensee, GSPDA, whose Palm OS smartphones are selling quite well in Asia.

I can't comment on anything specific about palmOne, but I can assure you that PalmSource has a strong and growing commitment to the Chinese market.

Mike
CCO, PalmSource Inc.

Gee, Mike, on my keyboard the "O" key is right beside the "I" key and the "M" and "N" look kinda close as well. Why so tense? Could that have been a minor typo for WinCE? But maybe you use a Dvorak keyboard.

And it's not like it's any secret that there's been a lot of tension between Palm and some Far East licencees over the years. Are you disputing anything the article claims?

- Is Palm keeping the Shanghai office open?
- Will Palm be maintaining contracts with Lenovo, Founder, and Acer Computer?
- Were those companies successful with PalmOS?
- Does PalmOS have a greater marketshare than WinCE/PPC?

How is this a "screwy" article?

Do you have any hard facts to back up your claim that one of your licensee's products is "selling quite well in Asia"? Are smartphones a tiny percentage of the overall PDA market? For all we know you may consider 5000 phones per quarter to be "selling quite well in Asia". More facts and less SPIN, please.

And what evidence do we have for "PalmSource [having] a strong and growing commitment to the Chinese market"? The evidence presented suggests you're retreating from a market you were unable to win (for any of a number of reasons).

The degree of bluster in your post is quite out of character for you and is vaguely reminiscent of the words of Mr. Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf.

The superb PalmOS app at the link below is a reminder why healthy scepticism is warranted when hearing the words of both business and political representatives.

http://tinyurl.com/6lhzs

Respectfully yours,
TVoR




******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What a screwy article
Admin @ 11/11/2004 12:01:26 AM #
I had thought that this article was somewhat suspect, it turns out that it is not even a Forbes article, but is republished from the China Business Post.

-Ryan

RE: What a screwy article
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/11/2004 12:55:57 AM #
How does the original article being published in a Chinese report make it suspect? Are the things discussed true or not?



******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What a screwy article
ganoe @ 11/11/2004 11:34:37 AM #
I have to agree. This article sounded screwy from the start. As soon as I saw the title, I was like: PalmOne sells PDAs in China??? Not that I'm aware of. Then its discussion of the actual Palm OS licensees in China in sufficiently vague enough to provide no info.
RE: What a screwy article
Admin @ 11/11/2004 12:06:16 PM #
I have some amount of trust in Forbes to believe the article, however I know nothing about the China Business post. It could be a RED party anti-capitalist paper for all we know!

So with that in mind, please just take this story on the grounds that palmOne (not PalmSource) has shut down a sales office in China. I don't think the reports on the other companies are accurate.

-The Typing Fingers of Ryan

RE: What a screwy article
Gekko @ 11/11/2004 12:21:05 PM #

Yeah - I'm sure that the article is just a part of a big, vast anti-Palm conspiracy by MSFT.

Kubler-Ross Sequence of Emotions

1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance



These posts make no sense
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/11/2004 12:44:41 PM #
So with that in mind, please just take this story on the grounds that palmOne (not PalmSource) has shut down a sales office in China. I don't think the reports on the other companies are accurate.

OK, Ryan, can you explain this:

Why would a PalmSource executive post a frantic reply to this article (within hours of it being posted!) if it had nothing to do with PalmSource? And why would he simply not post a FACTUAL response outlining how the article was false? The only vagueness I see here is from Michael Mace. Since he's lurking here at Palminfocenter, I would suggest he clear up this confusion buy posting a straightforward response addressing the points raised in the article.

As I posted above:

- Is Palm keeping the Shanghai office open?
- Will Palm be maintaining contracts with Lenovo, Founder, and Acer Computer?
- Were those companies successful with PalmOS?
- Does PalmOS have a greater marketshare than WinCE/PPC?

How is this a "screwy" article?

Do you have any hard facts to back up your claim that one of your licensee's products is "selling quite well in Asia"? Are smartphones a tiny percentage of the overall PDA market? For all we know you may consider 5000 phones per quarter to be "selling quite well in Asia". More facts and less SPIN, please.

And what evidence do we have for "PalmSource [having] a strong and growing commitment to the Chinese market"? The evidence presented suggests you're retreating from a market you were unable to win (for any of a number of reasons).


The silence from Palm is deafening.
And the BS levels are rising.





******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What a screwy article
Admin @ 11/11/2004 1:19:40 PM #
Voice,
Mr Mace can not speak for palmOne, he works for PalmSource. You should address your questions to someone at palmOne such as Bradley or Colligan. He's not going to answer questions for another company he can't speak for.

This article specifically refers to palmOne. Yet it interchanges the two Palms and has some clear errors in the article. I doubt the reporter understands the PDA market well enough to cover this.

I assume he responded because, like myself and others have pointed out, the article's reporting, numbers and proofing seem suspect and I can not trust what is being presented in a Chinese newspaper from Shanghai.

-Ryan

RE: What a screwy article
Gekko @ 11/11/2004 8:36:10 PM #
RE: What a screwy article
The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/11/2004 9:10:20 PM #
Mr Mace can not speak for palmOne, he works for PalmSource. He's not going to answer questions for another company he can't speak for.

I assume he responded because, like myself and others have pointed out, the article's reporting, numbers and proofing seem suspect and I can not trust what is being presented in a Chinese newspaper from Shanghai.

Ryan, I guess you have a lot more faith in PalmSource/One executives than I do right now. Personally, I think Mike Mace responded because this was yet another damaging bit of news affecting PalmSource (losing major licencees). The fact that we haven't heard another peep out of him since then suggets this is true - don't you think as PalmSource's CCO he would know whether or not PalmSource had just lost three Chinese licencees?

Regarding the article - translating from Cantonese to English isn't exactly an exact science. I wouldn't discount the article until we see proof that everthing it mentioned was incorrect.

This is all pretty lame. PalmSource is looking more and more like they're about to give up the market without a fight. It's almost as if they're TRYING to destroy themselves.



******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

RE: What a screwy article
Foo Fighter @ 11/12/2004 10:43:21 AM #
Why do so many people still confuse PalmOne with PalmSource? I keep seeing messasges like..."they should stop making handhelds and focus on the OS".

Anyway, PalmSource (the OS Company) faces some real challenges. In the US market there is now only one vendor producing "traditional" Palm-powered PDAs. Tapwave is a gaming handheld startup with little market share. PSource keeps cheering about all it's licensees in the vertical market, etc., but these companies aren't selling consumer products. PalmOS is losing, no...HAS ALREADY lost its brand awareness. Now PalmOne handhelds are just another brand sitting on store shelves.

The Palm Economy is in recession.

-------------------------------
Editor, http://Pocketfactory.com
Contributing Editor, http://digitalmediathoughts.com

It's the end of PDAs as we know them

Strider_mt2k @ 11/10/2004 3:02:11 PM #
and I feel fine...

RE: It's the end of PDAs as we know them
madhatter @ 11/10/2004 3:22:10 PM #
"the sky is falling, the sky is falling".. this forum is turning into a bunch of chicken little's.. you have been saying Palm will be out of business next year for the past 6 years..

Get Over It!

A Palm in hand is worth two in your pocket.

RE: It's the end of PDAs as we know them
statik @ 11/10/2004 5:13:13 PM #
"Get Over It!"

I second that! Enough complaining already. Lets find some positive things to talk about.

RE: It's the end of PDAs as we know them
mikecane @ 11/10/2004 6:14:22 PM #
OK, here's something positive: I like the T3 over the T5.

RE: It's the end of PDAs as we know them
GearHead @ 11/10/2004 10:05:41 PM #
I second that!

I love ant T, T2 and T3 million times more than T5!!!

Cheers,


Palm III>Palm IIIx>PalmV>PalmVx>Palm m505>Palm M515>Tungsten T
Dell X30 624Mhz w/BT+Wi-Fi
Nokia 6600 w/BT

Oh brudda...
Strider_mt2k @ 11/11/2004 6:41:33 AM #
It IS the end of PDAs as we know them.

I was really making a joke, but in reality the scene is truly changing.

Covergence and growing wireless data capabilities will render the "standard" PDA a dinosaur.

You're telling me that

A: This isn't true?
and
B: This is an alarmist attitude?

Get your collective heads out of the sand. The sky isn't falling, it's CHANGING.

Evolve or die.



Go WomCE!!!!!

bobes @ 11/10/2004 7:54:40 PM #
it's all over...

how about a symbian-esque linux alternative?

How about a free PDA for the 100,000th post, Ryan?

The_Voice_of_Reason @ 11/11/2004 12:55:57 AM #
How about a Zodiac 2? Or ten Tungsten T"5"?



******************************************************************
Sony CLIE UX100: 128 MB real RAM, OLED screen. All the PDA anyone really ever wanted.

The Reality of Palm Incorporated in 2004...

ChiA @ 11/10/2004 6:08:35 PM #
is that like Czechoslovakia it no longer exists. There are people on this board who don't seem to accept this FACT about Palm. It split into PalmOne and PalmSource on 29 Oct 2003. They are TWO SEPARATE companies with potentially two differnet agendas. True, they are dependent on each other, just as say an airplane manufacturer is dependent on the company which makes the engines - no engine, no point to plane and vice-versa. However, the plane maker can buy engines from different companies and the engine maker can sell their engines to several different plane makers. PalmSource can be thought of as the engine maker whilst PalmOne is the plane maker. Earlier news was just a reminder that in theory PalmOne can switch to a different engine (i.e. Pocket PC): they use the same processors as the PocketPC anyway.

Thus is (heaven forbid) PalmSource were to die then they can switch over to PocketPC or Symbian -maybe PalmOne discussing the matter of Pocket PC is a ploy to get more favourable licensing terms from PalmSource for Cobalt (Palm OS 6). If I was PalmOne I'd have a research team seeing experimenting with making PocketPC or Symbian devices simply as insurance should PalmSource fold. Such a project will understandably have to be kept very, very quiet indeed. Another option is to buy up whatever's left of the PalmSource carcass (a la Be style).

If PalmOne were to fold then PalmSource simply carries on licensing to Sony, Tapwave, Garmin etc. The question will be whether it receives sufficient revenue to sustain itself.

What's the relevance to the Closure of Shanghai Office? Well it's been described as a PalmONE office; I couldn't find any press on either company's site. If it's PalmOne office then maybe it's no big deal provided another Palm OS manufacturer (i.e. within China) is more sucessful at selling their units than PalmONE. If it's the PalmSOURCE office that's closed then that's a big big concern, it will mean nobody's interested in selling a Palm OS handheld in China - the world's largest market.

RE: The Reality of Palm Incorporated in 2004...
ackmondual @ 11/11/2004 4:17:47 AM #
Wow. Coincidence. I'm currently vacationing in Shanghai right now. I haven't been able to find ANY semblance of PDAs here except for PPC Phone editions (not that i've tried yet). Didn't even kno Palm had an office in Shanghai. Cell phones are the craze here. That and the average income here is like several hundred USD$ / month. That leave alot of sales for PDAs. Cell phones are still more practical here as well.

And now to enjoy a gourmet meal for < $3 USD :P

[signature0]the secret to enjoying your job is to have a hobby that's even worse[/signature0]
[signature1]My PDAs: Visor --> Visor Neo (blue) --> Zire 71.... so ends the "marathon", for now[/signature1]

RE: The Reality of Palm Incorporated in 2004...
ChiA @ 11/11/2004 1:56:31 PM #
" Didn't even kno Palm had an office in Shanghai. "

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry after reading that phrase in the reply to my post.

Once again, Palm is NO MORE. It separated into two SEPARATE companies, PalmSource and PalmOne. They are SEPARATE companies just as Microsoft and Dell are two separate companies.

READ my post for some more info ( but please forgive my typos =) ).

RE: The Reality of Palm Incorporated in 2004...
ackmondual @ 11/12/2004 1:37:13 AM #
Palm, PalmOne, yet another typo. I figured that most people by now would infer Palm as PalmOne (since they have long split up) since any1 who refers to "Palm" really means "PalmOne" or "PalmSource". At any rate, I didn't know that Palm*One* had an office in Shanghai
RE: The Reality of Palm Incorporated in 2004...
ChiA @ 11/12/2004 2:21:04 AM #
Ha, ha ha. You should know by now that Palm and PalmOne are no typos! Whatever most people think, the FACT is Palm no longer exists. Most people I meet think that Czechoslovakia still exists even though on 1 January 1993 it split into two countries -The Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic - just as Palm split into two companies.

People can just as easily infer either of the two companies so the distinction is lost. The distinction is important because the two companies make their money in distinctly different ways: PalmOne by selling handhelds/smartphones and associated solutions/accessories; PalmSource by licensing the PalmOS.

PalmOne closing an office means they couldn't sell their handhelds in China, which may be a sign of their inability to compete with a more popular Chinese/Asian PalmOS licensee. This wouldn't matter to PalmSource because they'd be making money from that licensee.

On the other hand PalmSource closing an office means no one in China is interested in buying a PalmOS device - whether it comes from PalmOne, Acer, Tapwave, Lenovo or whomever. PalmSource closing down is the much more worrying scenario of the two. If PalmOne collapses the Palm OS platform will still be around provided PalmSource still makes money from the remaining PalmOS licensees. PalmSource collapsing effectively means the end of the PalmOS platform.

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