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Hewlett Packard said today that it is selling its troubled WebOS operating system to LG Electronics. LG had worked with HP on the operating system, and is expected to use it for its line of smart televisions. Both companies declined to reveal the terms of the deal.
A developer working over winter break from his college has managed to get Open webOS -- the descendant of the operating system that powered Palm and HP's ill-fated mobile devices -- to work on the Asus-produced Nexus 7 tablet from Google. The port is still in alpha stages, showing some lag and freezing while running on the Nexus 7, but the developer was able to get Wi-Fi and Internet browsing working on the device. Thanks to prior work done porting Open webOS to Samsung's Galaxy Nexus, the device even supports a "virtual gesture area," allowing it to retain the gesture-driven interface that was a signature of Palm's defunct operating system.
HP is, yet again, working on a smartphone, the company's CEO and President Meg Whitman indicated in a video interview with Fox Business. Whitman's comments can be taken to mean that the phone will be aimed in emerging markets, as the phone is the first kind of computing device owned by people there. Unlike HP's previous, ill-fated effort with webOS-powered devices, this time the company will take the time to do it right, she added.
Google is said to have hired the core employees of the webOS Enyo HTML 5 development project team. According to The Verge, the team members were hired individually by Google, but will regroup as a team when they start work with the search giant. Enyo is an HTML5-based application framework for webOS and plays an integral part in HP’s plans to open-source the mobile OS. HP has since issued as statement saying that the staff departures will not impact its planned late 2012 release schedule for Open webOS.
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison in commentary during the ongoing trial against Google revealed that he had tried to buy RIM or Palm. An internal investigation had explored the idea, which was meant to improve competition with Apple or Google. The database developer concluded that it was a "bad idea" that didn't make financial or competitive sense.
A new Pew study has emphasized the rift in technology adoption for the US. About 19 percent of Americans have a tablet of some sort, researches said, and as many have an e-reader. A full 22 percent of Americans, however, had no Internet access at all, a figure that has remained largely constant since 2009.
When HP released its ill-fated 10-inch TouchPad, it was also prepping a smaller seven-inch version for the market. In August it sent the device to the FCC for regulatory approval, and even through the company abandoned the entire webOS-based family a few weeks later, HP did not pull the submission for the smaller tablet. Wireless Goodness has now posted photos from the FCC filing's teardown.
HP has moved webOS CTO Sam Greenblatt out of his role as leader of the company's Open webOS project. Greenblatt had headed the initiative after HP created the group in January to move the OS, which had been the foundation of HP's now defunct TouchPad hardware platform and software, to an open standards-based architecture.
Rovio iPhone; $3, iPad) and the ad-sponsored Android version (Google Play) along with desktop versions. The company didn't give a breakdown of which versions were most popular, although iOS has historically outperformed Android, even with the paid versus free split.
A follow-up study through ChangeWave has shown that corporate uptake of iPads was only climbing higher in February despite more concerted attempts from Android makers. Of those hoping to buy tablets in the spring, he number of companies looking to buy the iPad shot from 77 percent in November to a new high of 84 percent just last month. Without exception, every Android tablet designer's share of tablet interest declined, with none crossing into double digits.
At the SXSW conference, German luxury carmaker BMW revealed that the BMW Apps and Mini Connected systems in its vehicles now support the popular Stitcher smartphone app. The podcast-focused streaming app can be controlled from the infotainment system, including searching, providing feedback, and creating custom stations. Any cover art is also displayed on the vehicle's screen and is controlled over the iDrive interface, Engadget learned.
More Americans now own smartphones than basic cellphones, Pew Internet deduced on Thursday. By looking at those who either said they had a smartphone or mentioned it using a smartphone platform, the study found that 53 percent of American cellphone owners had a smartphone as of February. With 88 percent of the entire adult American population using a cellphone, that translated to 46 percent of all adults owning a smartphone.
Leaks have spread word Friday that HP has cut 275 more webOS team workers. Primarily located around the team's Sunnyvale, California offices, the cuts outlined to AllThingsD would follow a previous 500 from September. An official statement confirmed beliefs that it was a result of open-sourcing webOS and thus not needing either the hardware team or large parts of the software group.
As part of the launch of its ill-fated TouchPad, HP lined up several top content providers, including Time, Inc., to offer online subscriptions on the tablet. Now, almost seven months after HP stopped marketing the TouchPad, Time has notified subscribers that it will soon stop delivering content to their webOS-powered devices. The publisher will end support for the platform on March 10.
HP's chief Meg Whitman in a presentation at her company's Global Partner Conference on Wednesday was concerned that Google's likely completed Motorola acquisition would create a chilling effect in mobile. While she knew Apple's iOS by definition was closed, she was concerned Google might flip on the concept of openness now that it had its own hardware manufacturer, according to Channel Buzz. To her, this signaled the importance of Open webOS, since it might be the only option for some.
HP on Tuesday released its open-source Isis browser in the wake of its recently opened-up webOS platform. Meant for developers and dubbed Isis Project, the web browser engine is said to be fast and comply with current standards. It's based on the Enyo framework for webOS and uses both QtWebKit as well as JavaScriptCore.
An escaped USA Today presentation has uncovered some of the real results of mobile news app downloads. GeekWire's copy showed a wide gap between downloads for the iPad and Android tablets: at over 2.9 million downloads, the iPad version had more than seven times the downloads of Android, which had 390,000 combined. The ratio on Android was heavily skewed by the Kindle Fire, which at 260,000 downloads had managed twice as much interest as every other Android tablet combined.
HP has provided the developer community a software kernel that could enable its now discontinued TouchPad to run the Android OS. The kernel and some other GPL components evidently had been used by the company to adapt some of the tablets to run Android on the device's hardware. RootzWiki has posted the officially blessed code for download.
A quick leak Monday has uncovered that webOS chief architect Brian Hernacki has left HP. Details were short from The Verge's source, but the webOS team member had come in during 2009. There weren't indications as to where he was going next.
HP's newly departed Jon Rubinstein has explained his reasons for going in an interview Friday. He clarified to The Verge that he had planned to leave not long after HP bought Palm and agreed to stay one to two years, both to help transition webOS to HP and out of affinity with Personal Systems Group head Todd Bradley. Whether or not the TouchPad succeeded was incidental, as Rubinstein had already decided beforehand that he wouldn't stay permanently.
HP has confirmed that former Palm CEO and one-time Apple executive Jon Rubinstein was leaving the company. Representative Mylene Mangalindan explained to AllThingsD that Rubinstein had "fulfilled his commitment" to stay for one to two years after HP's acquisition of Palm. He wasn't leaving for another company and isn't believed to have some other specific goal.
Despite being discontinued, HP's TouchPad tablet is up for sale again, at Woot. It's a refurbished 32GB model, priced at $220, or about $70 more than the last refurbished 32GB TouchPads sold on eBay. Shipping is a much more manageable $5 for the new sale, however.
HP has acted on its promise to open-source webOS with an important change that could affect the devices that use it. Now called Open webOS, it's moving to a common Linux kernel that will let hardware makers use much more typical drivers and bring it to hardware beyond what HP originally intended. The OS will sit under an Apache 2 license, which will let others copy code as long as they include the license and attribution.
About 21 percent of iPhone 4S buyers are opting for the top-end 64GB model, despite a $399 US pricetag, a Consumer Intelligence Research Partners survey suggests. The group recently surveyed 365 people who bought a 4S during the December quarter, narrowing down candidates from an initial range of 6,316 respondents. The 4S is the first iPhone to have a 64GB option instead of just 8, 16, or 32GB.
HP reshuffled its leadership again on Tuesday with the decision to promote Bill Veghte to Chief Strategy Officer. The step up, which will still give him responsibilities as VP of Software, will see him head not just the company's more recent cloud initiatives but the operation of open-sourcing webOS. Veghte has the "knowledge and vision" to keep the company on top, CEO Meg Whitman said.
HP TouchPad owners finally may soon be able to run Android 4.0 on their tablet. The CyanogenMod team has released a preview (below) of their upcoming CM9 build for the device. The upcoming version is much more fully featured than previous renditions of the Android port, and will incorporate almost all functionality except the camera and video playback.
HP has posted updates for webOS. It now has webOS 3.0.5 available for owners of the TouchPad, which the company initially launched and then quickly shelved last summer. It's also making a separate release, webOS 2.2.4, available to Pre 2 and Pre 3 smartphone owners.
Recently departed webOS Community Manager Chuq von Rospach has added to the explanations for why webOS was failing with new details of his own. While careful not to blame HP solely or even primarily for the platform's decline, von Rospach noted that the culture fostered under ousted CEO Leo Apotheker only exacerbated what's cast as a revolving-door culture. He likened it to the nadir of Apple's leadership under Michael Spindler, who preceded Gil Amelio and was well before the clarity and lean organization that defined Steve Jobs' return.
New scoops both public and private have suggested that Palm, and later HP, may have ultimately had hurdles at the corporate level, not just technical, to ever challenging Apple or Google. WebOS didn't have either the needed management or engineers to bring it to completion, a New York Times source said, and there were few WebKit-savvy developers weren't already working on iOS or Android. This was compounded by a rush to finish the OS in nine months, which required taking shortcuts such as skipping proper APIs (app programming interfaces) until later, hurting the ability for third-party developers to sign on.
(Update: the letter is posted) Ousted HP chief Mark Hurd late Wednesday lost an appeal against a ruling that will make an accusation letter public. The Delaware court determined that the contents discussing the Jodie Fisher involvement were only "mildly embarrassing" and weren't protected the same way genuine trade secrets might. It wouldn't violate California privacy rights, and many of the details had been leaked to the public and weren't overly detailed, the court argued.
HP had tried to sell webOS before it settled on open-sourcing the platform, according to a rumor on Wednesday. Sources for VentureBeat claimed that HP had supposedly been asking for the same $1.2 billion that it paid for Palm in 2010 to avoid taking a loss. If it had been talking to Amazon and other companies, they may have balked given that HP was charging the same price for a division whose hardware had since been taken off the market.
HP's stillborn TouchPad Go has been given its first and possibly only review on Tuesday in a sign that it might have been the tablet HP should have launched first. The seven-inch tablet handled by webOS Nation has the same 1024x768 display as before and the faster dual-core 1.5GHz chip from the 64GB TouchPad, making it not only as capable but giving it a much sharper screen. While the cameras weren't high quality, it had a five-megapixel rear camera and was much more useful than the front-only camera on the 9.7-inch TouchPad.
Microsoft confirmed late rumors and said it would make 2012 its last CES keynote. Company Corporate Communications VP Frank Shaw said the company's launch windows "generally don’t align" with the January show and that it didn't make sense to have a keynote or booth in the future. Shaw indirectly admitted that the company was increasingly keynoting CES because it was "the way we've always done it" rather than for actual product launches, which were often months after the show.
HP TouchPad owners who snapped up the tablet during August's fire sale or this week's eBay auction of refurbished units may soon be able to run a fully functional version of Android on the device. A preliminary version of a MIUI ROM for the tablet, which normally runs webOS, has been posted on the XDA Developers' site. The alpha version of the ROM is reported to be relatively stable and offers most of the core functionality of Android 2.3.
The Wednesday report about HP considering a change of its logo and philosophy won't result in any changes, Brand New learned from an HP spokesperson. Marketing agency Moving Brands was asked by HP in 2008 to propose new ideas for a number of brand identity elements, including fonts, graphics, and logos. The company used of the these designs, but told the source it has no plans to adopt the new logo Moving Brands made.
Amazon's Kindle Fire could cut Apple's share of the tablet market to under 60 percent for the first time, IDC estimated Thursday. Android would climb from 32.4 percent to get a collective 40.3 percent through the Fire which, along with some help from the Nook Tablet, would push the iPad down from 61.5 percent this summer to 59 percent of tablets. The BlackBerry PlayBook would lose some ground as well, down from 1.1 percent to 0.7 percent, while the HP TouchPad's final exit would give up five percent.
HP contractor Moving Brands has proposed a remake of the company's signature logo that would be as much a change of philosophy as image. Its remake would go to four angled lines that imply the logo and would be more modern than the current design, which is still closer to the icon from the company's early days. The angle would not only dictate the theme of promo material but even integrate into products, such as the capacity on inkjet printers.
HP saw one of its former Apple hires leave Tuesday after Chuq von Rospach revealed he was leaving the company. The webOS Developer Relations Community Manager confirmed that it was to leave for a position at another company that he "had to pursue." While not naming the company, he stressed that it didn't have anything to do with the decision to open-source webOS.
An NPD Group look back at most of 2011 has shown the sheer change in the smartphone business in the past year. Android was now the majority, having climbed from 42 percent in all of 2010 to 53 percent from the start of 2011 through October. Despite the pressure, though, Apple too grew share the entire year and actually grew at a faster relative rate, bouncing back from a dip to 21 percent in 2010 to a new high of 29 percent by this October.
This weekend's eBay TouchPad sale saw 7,850 of the refurbished devices find buyers, which is all the stock HP had on hand. The 16GB eBay listing saw 2,316 sales, priced at $99, while the 32GB model sold 5,534 units at $149. All were sold in less than 25 minutes, making eBay and PayPal work much slower and return a number of errors and unsuccessful transactions.
HP chief Meg Whitman and key board member Marc Andreessen in an interview Friday revived talk of webOS tablets following a decision to open-source the code. Despite quashing any near-term hopes, Andreessen explained to TechCrunch that HP saw not only other companies making webOS tablets but also HP itself. There might not be any hardware in 2012, Whitman added, but it would certainly happen by 2013.
HP at its all-hands meeting Friday said it was open-sourcing webOS. Both the Enyo app framework and the OS itself would be published under a license. The company expected to "continue to be active" in making and supporting webOS, but mobile hardware would have to come from others.
HP's definitive answer on webOS should come at an all-hands meeting on Friday. Leaked details from staff to PreCentral have CEO Meg Whitman briefing the webOS Global Business Unit at 1:30PM Eastern. The outcome itself isn't known and will likely be a secret until Whitman's presentation.
HP's unreleased TouchPad Go has surfaced in a very rare eBay auction. The 32GB, 3G model is being sold from China and may have been one of the few if any devices that was fully completed but didn't reach stores. Apart from cosmetic wear, it's fully functional and is running a version of webOS optimized for the seven-inch screen.
The UK's Crown Prosecution Service made an unusual decision for a test pilot with tablets for its attorneys, officials said Friday. A Norwich crown court told The Guardian it will give prosecutors 35 HP TouchPads, supposedly worth up to £1,000 ($1,560) each, to keep court documents digitally during cases. Police would send information directly to lawyers with the goal of ultimately saving as much as £50 million ($78 million) by the next UK parliament.
Sony Ericsson early this week revealed that Xperia owners will get the same 50GB of cloud storage space as their iOS counterparts. It has now clarified that announcement, stating that the Box for Android mobile app isn't quite ready for release. Sony Ericsson would only say the company is in the middle of finalizing the promotion and that it's coming soon.
Apple could overtake HP in the computing space in 2012, HP chief Meg Whitman said in a new interview late Tuesday. Referring to a Canalys estimate that had Apple as the top computer builder next year if the iPad was included, she told France's Le Figaro that it was possible. The company would try to get back to the top spot in 2013, but Whitman herself was so recent that her impact wouldn't be felt for some time.
Android's share of the US smartphone market started leveling off in the summer, Nielsen said Tuesday. With Android at 42.8 percent, its overall summer share was the same as what it managed in August. Apple was also unaffected and held the iPhone firm at 28.3 percent.
A rumor emerging from HP's prospective sale of its webOS group has identified a new buyer as well as the possible reasons for HP's indecision on the subject. The VentureBeat tip claimed that Intel has just started discussing the prospect of a deal. Qualcomm, best known for its Snapdragon chips, was allegedly still in discussions in spite of public denials.
HP, not Samsung, was the ruler of non-iPad tablets in the US for the first ten months of the year, the NPD Group said in a new study. With just 1.2 million tablets sold at retail across every company outside of Apple, HP was the leader in the country at 17 percent, or 204,000, sold between its launch and October. The low count suggests that the fire sale $99 TouchPad, not HP's Windows range, was the sales leader by going on clearance.
