Within the tech industry, one can say that the competition boils down to the survival of the fittest. While there are companies like Apple and Google who continues rake in success, there are others that just aren't so lucky. And one such company that belongs to the latter is Hewlett-Packard. Today, during the company's press release that lead up to their Q3 conference call, HP just made an announcement that they will be discontinuing the Touchpad and all smartphones that runs under webOS.
During the company's press release, HP has made it clear that they will phasing out all their products that runs the webOS which includes HP Pre 3 smartphones, HP Veer and the tablet HP TouchPad.
During the company's press release, HP has made it clear that they will phasing out all their products that runs the webOS which includes HP Pre 3 smartphones, HP Veer and the tablet HP TouchPad.
HP reported that it plans to announce that it will discontinue operations for webOS devices, specifically the TouchPad and webOS phones. HP will continue to explore options to optimize the value of webOS software going forward.
This news is no doubt a gut punch to hardcore webOS fans who stood by to support its products with the hopes that things would eventually get better. But it never did. webOS is a unique and interesting operating system that were introduced back in 2009 in an effort to revive the relevance and profitability of Palm in the tech industry. Both software and hardware were designed to compete with industry bigshots, Apple and Google but somehow it came up short. HP bought Palm for $1.2 billion and it seems that it was all for naught.
This news is no doubt a gut punch to hardcore webOS fans who stood by to support its products with the hopes that things would eventually get better. But it never did. webOS is a unique and interesting operating system that were introduced back in 2009 in an effort to revive the relevance and profitability of Palm in the tech industry. Both software and hardware were designed to compete with industry bigshots, Apple and Google but somehow it came up short. HP bought Palm for $1.2 billion and it seems that it was all for naught.
The HP Touchpad was touted to be the iPad killer but when it was released it was met with mediocre reviews and suffered from poor sales. The same happened with Veer, it didn't exactly set the market on fire. Well as for the HP Pre 3, it hasn't even seen the light of day in the market. Slow sales, minimal media coverage and several price cuts, it was only a matter of time for the webOS devices to hit rock bottom. So one can say that this scenario was inevitable.
So what happens to webOS now? Despite not being the most popular operating system, webOS somehow found a dedicated fan base. Last year, HP was rather all praises about the system and how were they planning to integrate them into their traditional computers, printers and even cars. While HP confirmed that they will be killing their webOS product line, the company added that they will be exploring other options on how they can optimize the webOS software.
So what happens to webOS now? Despite not being the most popular operating system, webOS somehow found a dedicated fan base. Last year, HP was rather all praises about the system and how were they planning to integrate them into their traditional computers, printers and even cars. While HP confirmed that they will be killing their webOS product line, the company added that they will be exploring other options on how they can optimize the webOS software.
The webOS is technically not dead yet but unless HP finds a way to utilize it in any way, it might as well be. One option for them is to license the OS to its partners and rely on them to manufacture webOS devices. But with Android over the horizon, it would be a tough sell for HP. As of this writing, no official word yet from HP when are they going to pull out the webOS devices from the market.
It is indeed a sad day not only for the hardcore webOS fans but for the geekdom in general.
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