“Cannacord analyst Peter Misek said Tuesday he’d ‘recently learned’ AT&T would delay launching the two Palm handsets due to what he said was a ‘long list of technical issues’ with the smartphones,” Sutherland writes. “Ehud Gelblum of Morgan Stanley, said Tuesday he believes Palm’s only hope is to close its manufacturing and license the webOS. However, others see Palm as a ripe target for acquisition, notably either Google or Apple.”
Sutherland writes, “Apple has said Palm could be on its short list of companies likely sued for patent infringement claims. Although Palm would unlikely be able to finance a defense, “Google could buy a law firm and not even notice the drop in its bank account,” Sherman said. Apple could also buy Palm to deny Google that legal cushion.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Here’s what we wrote over 14 months ago: Apple could buy Palm this afternoon with petty cash. In fact, maybe that’s what Palm and Elevation Partners – and Wall Street speculators – are really shooting for: a buyout by Apple or some other company. Apple would buy Palm in order to absorb a would-be competitor and/or gain access to certain patents and technologies and/or to prevent another company from making the acquisition. – MacDailyNews, January 9, 2009
For $5 million and no more, then yes.
The marketplace has certainly provided evidence over the last 14 months that Apple doesn’t need any patents or technologies that Palm may have in order to dominate and expand the market for smartphones. For the same reasons, Apple would not care if another competitor has them.
So, there is absolutely no reason for Apple to purchase Palm.
So does anyone know what worthwhile patents Palm may own?
They absolutely should buy Palm to obtain the patents.
They should also specify that all former Apple employees in management roles either have their stock cancelled or turned in without financial reward- and that they have no job in the new company.
Buying a competitor to kill it is a MSFT strategy, not Apple’s.
It’s been reported that Google has no smartphone patents and thus is in a weak position when it comes to lawsuits. Apple should snatch up Palm’s patents just to prevent Google from obtaining them. But Apple shouldn’t buy all of Palm — just the patents. Apple doesn’t want or need the headaches of supporting existing Palm users.
Palm would be worth an acquisition if Google weren’t also in the market. If Google were to acquire them, they would certainly be worth having Apple go on the offensive.
Apple managed to build pretty decent handset without any of Palm’s IP. Let Google overpay for them, then sue their dicks into the dirt.
But but but…..G4’s attack of the show gave the Palm Pre Plus a 5 out of 5. Though mainly because it is like under $50 now.
The only thing to buy Palm for is maybe the card interface the WebOS uses (and any patents they own or have applied for in this regard) and just to tank the whole WebOS thing.
The real battle is going to be between Microsoft and Google’s Android.
Strange idea! What for?
From my understanding, PALM still has some valuable patents. Apple may consider buying PALM just for those.
Should Apple buy Palm? In a word: no. In two words: @#$% NO!
Like MacSmiley said, Apple is not in the business of buying out competition just to eliminate a competitor.
No synergy with Palm. Netflix makes more sense.
@ Sarasota (& others floating the patent idea) – I doubt Palm’s patents are anywhere valuable enough to justify buying ALL OF PALM just for that. That’s like buying a toxic waste dump because there may be a small diamond buried somewhere in the middle of it.
Would that be rich.
Buy Palm and then send the managment packing again. Although with fat wallets!
A win for both parties.
Why would anyone buy Palm now?
Wait a year and save 3 or 4 million.
Apple could pull a Microsoft and acquire Palm just to kill it.
Apple isn’t Microsoft.
Microsoft may buy Palm, just to kill it. Google may buy Palm just to kill it, and to acquire the ability to say it owns some applicable patented technology.
If Apple were to buy Palm, it would have a strategy for the company and it’s technology.
Lots of speculation about the need to buy Palm, most centering on Palm’s patents and the defensive nature of such an acquisition.
I’m sure the DOJ would have something to say about that. Although Apple’s and Palm’s current relative sizes to the whole of the market is still fairly small, (WinMobile, Blackberry OS, Symbian, Android), given the iPhone’s meteoric rise the DOJ could rule the acquisition as anti-competitive, and deny it to go forward.
If they did it would be a tacit acknowledgement of the iPhone’s technological lead in the market.
Yes they should, I don’t know why they wouldn’t , come on , apple ,
Apple buys Palm. Steve Jobs FIRES Jon Rubinstein… Cost of the purchase, according to a karma relaxed Jobs, “Priceless”!
Heck! I will buy Palm just after I win $45 million on the Euro Lottery.
Let’s take a peek at stock prices:
Apple (AAPL) – 225.28
Palm (PALM) – 5.39
I gotta say, it would at least be cheap to buy, eh? Other than the fact that they could do it with petty cash, there is really no reason for them to do so. Let Hasbro buy them and make the Pre more sturdy.
Love that my “MDN Magic Word” for this post is “problems”
Buying Palm would be a waste of money. At the very most, Apple might want to purchase some patents to enable future product diversification. However, as the iPhone proves, the technology that Apple already controls is amongst the leaders in the marketplace. Buying a laggard would force Apple to:
– waste cash better used for new product development
– waste management attention as it winds down production/licensing/employment/facilities at Palm
– waste Apple resources supporting legacy Palm products
– waste opportunities to attract new customers to the Apple brand with discounted close-out Palm sales
Not a good plan. I’d rather see Apple buy Dell.
They could buy the patent portfolio from palm for $300M and license them back to palm, on a non-transferable license. It would give palm more time (more rope) to work with.
Keep the money for keeping GOOG at bay. There you have a viable threat; a clear and present danger. Palm is, and has been a failing irritation, nothing more. It would just be a distraction and a costly winding down.
It will be cheaper to buy Palm than let their patents fall into the hands of some patent troll that will file in the Eastern District of Texas against Apple over some imagined IP violation.
Palm has some interesting patents including the IP from the old Be OS, which had some good stuff in it.
I checked and the market cap for Palm is about $900,000,000. The patent office on line search showed 322 issued patents assigned to Palm. How many of those are junk or totally irrelevant would take a lot of attorney time to figure out. A patent portfolio would be useful, but at an average of 3 million each not counting Patent Office maintenance fees and a lot of pending patents that would need attention, the cost of obtaining and managing such a portfolio would be costly. Palm is dust anyway. Let them die in peace. When you have the bankroll Apple does, you can litigate and argue your patents endlessly. Google needs the patents more than Apple does.
Yawn… zzz… nooo… Apple better spend the money giving a big beach BBQ to its employees…
It would make more sense for RIM to buy Palm, since the Blackberry maker seems the furthest behind in developing decent touchscreen devices.
The iPhone OS is hands down the best, and from there it probably goes Android (assuming you actually have the latest version), WebOS (which employs some technologies that at least arouse some excitement to people who won’t buy Apple products) and the new Microsoft 7 Series (which is totally unproven, of course, but will no doubt be something along the lines of what Windows is to the Mac — an inferior copy).
RIM has the Storm 2. It’s the least innovative of the also-rans and they could stand to win the most from the acquisition.
Yes Apple should purchase them for what was once a great innovator and great company, then mercifully lay them to rest. No massive bailout for CEO’s or stock holders or anything like that. More like comparable jobs for those who want to continue within Apple.
Business = Chess
Play to block your opponent.
Apple faces potential monopolist issues from our wonderful Totalitarian government in WDC now, and I would not want to bet that the “Great Leader” would allow a purchase of Palm.
If Palm’s patent portfolio is worth anything, then HTC or Nokia should buy Palm as a defensive move against Apple.
Imagine a series of patents:
– Apple for the Newton
– Palm for the Palm Pilot series
– Apple for the iPhone
– Palm for the WebOS
Now, think of all of the technologies that are derived from these: handwriting recognition, basic touch screen interfaces, multi-touch, phone computing, etc.
There are obviously some great patents at Palm, and great people outside of upper management. Imagine the strength of Apple’s handheld and touch screen patent portfolio and the long-term security that it would bring to the company while making life excruciating for competitors.
Next step? Wait for RIM to drop, snap up its patents.
This article describes the patents that Palm owns and Apple could buy:
http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/28/apple-vs-palm-the-in-depth-analysis/
Only if they got it dirt cheap, just to kill their brand and get their patents and top talent
@ gregmills, I want to agree with you, but if Google bought Palm (they paid almost that much for a mobile ad company with no revenue), Apple could end up paying that much for ONE patent infringement — or worse, Google could use it to get some kind of reciprocal patent licensing agreement with Apple.
Isn’t it worth a billion to nip that in the bud (I say as if it’s only pocket change).
@bobo
Good point, but the brand is dying all by itself and the top talent left long ago.
Why commit homicide if the victim is already dying?
I think Apple should buy Palm for their patents. They could hardly be accused of ‘buying to kill a competitor’ when Palm are pretty much dead anyway.
As an owner of several good-at-the time Palm products, I’ll be sad if disappear but they have only themselves to blame … they failed not only to innovate for years, but they didn’t listen to their customers crying out for adoption of then existing technology. Basic stuff like wifi.
No….
AAPL or GOOG should buy PALM only to deny MSFT buying it.
MSFT can cause a lot of problems with PALM patents and IP.
Note that I said cause problems. Not use the IP.
I think they should not buy Palm. Even though they have a great patent portfolio I still believe that they would go obsolote within a couple of decades. Apple should keep innovating and buy the right ingredients (companies) to help them stay as a mobile leader. Let google buy Palm, they would only get outdated technology while Apple continues to innovate.
It would be poetic — given that Palm gained it orginal PDA software platform from none other than Apple itself!