This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication - Western Union memo, 1876
|
|
|
Palm can go it alone says CEO
STRUGGLING GADGET MAKER Palm's CEO Jon Rubinstein is insisting to the world plus dog that the outfit does not need to be bought to get itself out of trouble.
True, it has not been able to sell many of its smartphones but it can still survive as an independent company in spite of disappointing sales of its flagship handsets, he claimed.
Rubinstein said that Palm would look at letting other mobile manufacturers use its smartphone operating system in a bid to make a bit of cash.
But he did say that Palm would consider takeover offers, particularly after the outfit had to bring in some banking advisers to examine all options.
Rubinstein said he was "bullish" about Palm's long-term prospects, however. He told the Financial Times (registraton required) that Palm can survive as an independent company.
He also has a cunning plan to get the company to profitability. There is also the small matter of a gross cash position of $592 million at the end of its third quarter.
However analysts at JPMorgan estimate that the company will burn through $534 million of that money before reaching break-even in May 2012.
Palm thinks that the reason its smartphones have sold poorly is because of ill-trained staff at shops owned by mobile operators who were unable to fully explain the handsets' capabilities to customers. µ
Share this:
Share
I don't quite get why they aren't making profit, they sell the phones for more than it cost to manufacture one would assume, so where does the money go? Developers? Hah it's known developers aren't the ones raking in cash by the boatload, so is it the nasty deals (aka bribes) the service providers ask? Or the insane bonuses of upper management again?
or patent licenses? Or all of the above?
Would be nice if at least this could serve as an example where the system fails, since palm isn't the only one having issues with staying afloat.
CJ: It's true ppl who sell cell/smart phones have pretty much no idea about them (also happens in computers). Also, everyone in tech knows this, so Palm should have thought of another way to promote their phones/OS.
Joe: I'd be asking: how's that we have a good phone and an excellent OS but we are unable to sell it... are we really that stupid? If it is as good as we claim, how can we not sell it? Isnt this the biggest failure of the Marketing and or Sales department?!
Palm can go it alone? Sure - they've done such a great job of it over the past 5 years.
If I were an investor, I'd ask why we should ignore years of negligence and failure to produce a competitive product simply because the CEO says to. I doubt if he can give much of an answer.
CJ, people are generally dumb. They go into the store and don't know their options. They rely on the salesperson to tell them what to buy, and if that salesperson has been brainwashed to promote only a couple of handsets and doesn't care to learn more about webOS, then the Palm phones don't get their fair share of promotion. Which is a shame, because the OS is way ahead of the competition...
It is very interesting that Palm is blaming the mobile operators. If Palm's OS is so intuitive then why is it so difficult to explain how to use and show the value?