I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
philmckinney.substack.com
I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
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Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#2> We knew the computing world was shifting toward mobile, and our traditional PC business faced real threats from tablets and smartphones. We needed to be there.
This right here is already game over. Unless they were the ones making the tablets and smartphones and being the threats to everyone else, they had lost at this point one way or another.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#3> We knew the computing world was shifting toward mobile, and our traditional PC business faced real threats from tablets and smartphones. We needed to be there. This right here is already game over. Unless they were the ones making the tablets and smartphones and being the threats to everyone else, they had lost at this point one way or another.
That is what HP acquired in Palm and webOS: smartphone and tablet products arguably on par with iOS and Android.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#4The absolute lack of vision in post millennium HP leadership is so toxic to innovation. It's a good case study in the pointlessness of obsessing over tech company financials.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#5> WebOS—true multitasking when iOS and Android couldn't handle it
Am I missing something?
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#6> We knew the computing world was shifting toward mobile, and our traditional PC business faced real threats from tablets and smartphones. We needed to be there. This right here is already game over. Unless they were the ones making the tablets and smartphones and being the threats to everyone else, they had lost at this point one way or another.
It isn’t game over, but the path to success clearly wasn’t to buy another company and release a product (that was probably already in the queue) only a year later.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#7If 1.2 billion dollars in valuation was destroyed in 49 days because the CTO wasn't there, there's something to be said about the CTO's inability to delegate and ensure they have a team that supports their decisions and vision and can carry on without them. "When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all."
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#8> We knew the computing world was shifting toward mobile, and our traditional PC business faced real threats from tablets and smartphones. We needed to be there. This right here is already game over. Unless they were the ones making the tablets and smartphones and being the threats to everyone else, they had lost at this point one way or another.
HP already had plenty of experience of building handheld computers at that point. Their own and from Compaq and Digital.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#9The book Androids by Chet Haase talks about how the early Android team had a lot of ex-Palm people on it.
Re: I convinced HP's board to buy Palm and watched them kill it
#10The absolute lack of vision in post millennium HP leadership is so toxic to innovation. It's a good case study in the pointlessness of obsessing over tech company financials.
I wonder how many companies had this play out? IBM is another famous example of internal rot of engineering excellence in the 2000s as the business shell was gives fresh coats of paint and varnish.