The Future of PalmOS
Continued from Previous Page
A Better Business Model
The hardware business is tough--a business plagued with razor-thin margins,
inventory headaches, supply shortages, and product obsolescence. Most
analysts would agree that making software is often a much better business.
There are often no cost-of-goods, warehouses, or raw materials to worry
about. And yet, the futures of software and hardware developers are
inseparably tied together. Software programs are useless without the
devices to run them, and most hardware platforms owe their success to one
or more "killer apps" which made their purchase worthwhile. How would the
Apple-II have sold without Visicalc... the IBM/PC without Lotus 1-2-3...
the Nintendo without Mario?
The software developers who make those killer apps want to be successful
too. After all, someone has to afford all those new-fangled gadgets and
devices that keep the whole ball rolling. So developers tend to write
programs for platforms that can offer the biggest crowd of program-using,
registration fee-paying customers. And "lots of customers" requires "lots
of devices;" typically more devices than a single company can create and
market on its own. Palm, in all their wisdom, has realized that their ultimate fate depends
not just on the sales of individual devices, but on the success of the
platform as a whole and the widespread adoption of PalmOS as a defacto
standard. In July 2001, Palm announced that it would separate the hardware
and software components of its business into separate companies, a process
that has recently completed. The hardware company kept the "Palm" name,
while the software group responsible for the operating system is now called
"PalmSource." >> Continued on Next Page...
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