The Palm Pre was the talk of CES 2009. Sadly, the company could not translate the original excitement into strong sales. Hope sprang again when Hewlett-Packard bought Palm in 2010 but died again quickly in the debacle that followed when the company decided to abandon the webOS platform only months after launching new smartphones and a tablet. HP turned webOS into an open source operating system and sold off webOS source code, patents and licenses to LG. webOS now powers some LG televisions and could make a return on some LG smartwatches. In the meantime, the Palm brand has been relegated to the annals of history.
But that could soon change. Signs now suggest that Palm could make a return to smartphones as early as this year. Palm.com now redirects you to a new website called mynewpalm.com where the slogan “smart move” is teased as “coming soon.”
Some sleuthing by webOS Nation has revealed that HP sold ownership of the Palm name, trademarks, and logos to a company called Wide Progress Global Limited earlier this year. Further digging has revealed that Wide Progress Limited was represented for the transaction by Vice-President Nicolas Zibell who also happens to be President, Americas and Pacific, of Alcatel OneTouch and TCL.
While Alcatel OneTouch has yet to make a public statement about this transaction, it appears that it now owns the Palm name. Why would it acquire this name if not to use it for some future products? Could Alcatel OneTouch be planning to revive the Palm name in a new line of smartphones? It’s certainly not out of the realm of possibility. Palm retains strong brand recognition in a number of markets and could help the company gain a stronger foothold there.
Anyone out there looking forward to the return of the Palm brand to the world of smartphones? Let us know below.
Sources : USPTO // webOS Nation