Mobile browser-maker Access announced Friday that it will acquire Palm OS developer PalmSource in an all-cash transaction for approximately $324 million. The acquisition adds operating system platform expertise and Linux development resources to Access's existing "content delivery and Internet access software" for mobile devices, the companies said.
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Oh man. I've been waiting for this one.
I figured they were positioning to sell, but geeesss I -never- would have guessed on a buyer. Especially this one, and for $324 million? Geees! PalmSource is going to be laughing all the way to the bank on that one.
No way that company is worth 324 million when Be was bargian-basement at 51. I mean, they haven't even released anything meaningfull in the last um... how long? PalmOS has become essentially irrelevant in the market space they helped pioneer. Pathetic.
At least Be wasn't beaten at the game they created.
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The fact that the company is unknown, doesn't make it a loser or something. Access is maker of NTTDocomo's (Imode) browser and responsible for the browser for the hugely succesful Nokia Series 60 and - more recently - the thing for Sony PSP. And now they buy Palmsource, which bought a Chinese mobile linux maker itself and still has some Be technology.
As far as I know, Palmsource will switch the kernel of its OS to a Linux kernel, like in the past the already changed a kernel three or four times without telling. Meaning: Api's and interfacing will remain the same.
Basically this unknown Jap browser maker thus buys himself an OS maker with a losing product now (PalmOS) but with huge installed user base and two alternative OS options in development: Cobalt (Be-variant with the multithreading problems) and Chinese Linux magic. Since those users won't go away in a year (Linux kernel will be available around May 2006 or something), it basically means this Jap company can upgrade their product line from a browser to an OS, which already has a userbase to serve. Nice startingpoint for a serious next generation Linux based Smartphone.
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Note that I have no opinion in all of this, though your comments are unsubstantiated nonsense;
the price is far too high
Why?
i suspect them to be part of a M$ middleman chain.
Are you saying Microsoft set this deal up? [~boggle~]
What tactical benifit would Microsoft have in doing such a thing?
As PalmOS was now worth no more than 100M imho
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=PSRC&t=1y
...market cap over $302M. So, your opinion is a wild (and incorrect) guess.
it would make beos worth 224M?? make no sense.
The BeOS company that is in Palm Source doesn't exist as a seperate company; it has been absorbed and parts have been split from Palm Source.
You aren't making any sense.
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netfront's browser is on most of the mobile phones in japan (think tens of millions). although as a company (access) and a brand name they are not that well-known, their share of the market is more than significant, at least in japan.
and for the beos source code, i dont think the company would open source nor continue the development on it. unless of course, some party specificly buy the rights from them.
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garapheane
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I still remember the day I rushed to CDW in chicago which was a block away from my job and bought a Palm the First week of its existence.
that year I ended up getting 3 replacements for cracked glass.
over the years I owned 6 different devices.
I used to make fun of people with PocketPC devices and really thought they would bomb, even thought I my heart of hearts I knew they where better (more memory, multitasking, much much faster processors) I really just wanted an MS attack on a market to fail.
Palm seemed so strong and sure of itself. Sony just joined the fold and unveiled beautiful devices, IBM was selling them, etc.
Today everything is PocketPC (or whatever name MS has changed it to today).
This really sucks in some ways, but really it goes to show how the pit-bulls at MS work.
They will keep trying until they get it, even if it is just close to right and then they slaughter the competition.
Goodbye Palm, you where really the best for what to introduce people to what they really wanted: The Newton, why did Apple have the timing all wrong, Now we are stuck with more MS KRAP.
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Yellow Tab... let's say they did license BeOS from PalmSource (or Be, Inc. for that matter)I'm not sure Access would continue licensing it to them because of all of the other licensing issues involved in BeOS itself.
It's kinda like Microsoft making Windows with other licensed code (like the font renderer, Java, RealPlayer under BeOS), them selling Windows to another company (just the assets) who has no reason to release Windows since it's such a crappy product with numerous incompatibilities with modern hardware (doesn't Windows?) and then that company gets purchased. Sometime during this process some company in Germany decides it has the source code (and the company licenses the other crap inside of the OS that makes it the OS everyone loved then licenses it to the german company), doesn't modify the code, but says they have improved it and bundled Gimp, MS Office, and a whole bunch of other crappy applications.
in this rant there is some thought process, I think...
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For many readers of OSNews, yellowTAB it seems to be the first problem of the world. They neglect an obvious problem with their continuous attacks to yellowTAB; this place becoming the place where the children play.
Be Inc., selling the rights the own intellectual property has tried to realize the maximum profit, stipulating before the sale, many contracts with Japanese companies.
Also the President of Sony had declared interested the purchase of PalmSource; the motivations could be the same ones that have carried Sony to the purchase of Ericsson, not the BeOS code.
The real motivations of the purchase of PalmSource we will not find, even if presents in the papers.
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Their OS and hardware are very lame and there are not much useful software that can run on it.
By today standard, a good PDA should have the following features.
1) Able to develop useful applications on it using Java without the need of another hardware like Windows PC/Mac.
2) Can play MP3, mpeg movies and other multimedia format files.
3) Have a USB connection and can act as external USB drive to store files from PC/MAC.
4) Can connect to internet using wireless and download e-mails, MP3 and instant messages.
5) View and edit spreadsheet/words/pdf documents.
6) Can connect to another USB drive to store data.
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From Redherring, link at the bottom
Access specializes in providing Internet access to a variety of devices, including set-top boxes, digital televisions, automobile telematics systems, as well as mobile phones and PDAs, where its NetFront browser is installed.
“We have about 200 million deployments of the mobile browser,” said Manuel Morales, general manager of global corporate communications at Access. “Essentially we’re in the non-PC space servicing just about any type of Internet access device in that space.”
http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=13519&hed=Access+Buys+Palm...
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>>>The real motivations of the purchase of PalmSource we will not find, even if presents in the papers.
The real business reason is easy to find.
Access and Opera makes money by selling web browsers for embedded devices. Access sells web browsers to Nokia and QNX.
A few months ago, Nokia decided to make their own browser with KHTML as their core.
http://dot.kde.org/1118683407/
Other embedded manufacturers will sooner or later --- switch to KHTML. So basically Access doesn't have a market to sell anymore.
The only thing they can do is to do a "Trolltech Qtopia" type of business.
