Jon Rubinstein
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Jon Rubinstein takes over as Palm CEO
You sort of knew this was coming after he shepherded the Pre to launch, but Palm just announced that Jon Rubinstein is taking over as CEO, replacing Ed Colligan after sixteen years in the top spot. After a short break, Colligan will join the very vocal Roger McNamee at major Palm investor Elevation Partners, so he won't be totally out of the loop, but the shuffle is still somewhat unexpected -- and the Palm / Apple bloodlines just got even deeper with the Rubinstein, the ex-head of the iPod and Mac divisions, now totally in charge.[Via Brighthand]
Palm live from D7
It's already been a crazy day for Palm news -- so who knows what Palm's Jon Rubinstein and Elevation Partner's Roger McNamee have in store (well, we have a few ideas). We're live at their D7 session and the fun is set to begin any moment, so stay tuned.Thanks to our editor-at-large and gdgt co-founder Ryan Block for handling photo duties during the show!
Roger McNamee self-parodies his Palm Pre superlatives: "it eats iPhones for breakfast"
The ever-quotable, perennially unkempt Roger McNamee of Elevation Partners fame indulged in a bit of self-parody in a mock-commercial screened at D7 before he and Jon Rubinstein took the stage. While incredibly entertaining, the video also acts as a bit of damage control for Roger, who infamously stated that there would be a massive and sudden exodus from the iPhone to the Pre once those original iPhone contracts are up. Palm naturally distanced itself and "clarified" the comments, but that doesn't seem to have dampened McNamee's spirit: in the video he calls the Pre, among other things, "better than Viagra." Unfortunately for McNamee, he might've been better served by a damage control video after his time on stage with Walt and Kara: his semi-sexist "It has a mirror on the back... there's never been a phone like this for women before" line -- not to mention a general disregard for sane conversation -- isn't winning him many points with the crowd. Video is after the break.
Palm OS 2 slipping from "early 2009" to "first half" of next year?
The New York Times has a little puff piece on Palm to accompany the launch of the Treo Pro today, and buried between the fawning references to Jon Rubinstein's former gig at Apple and how that's affected his management style ("He made them redesign the battery panel on the back so it didn't squeak. And he asked for fixes to the software so it would lock up less frequently." -- solid work, homey) there's a little tidbit about how Palm OS II and a single new device to run the new software will arrive in the "first half of next year." Two things interesting about that: first, that's a much wider timeframe than the "early 2009" window we've been hearing for a while and could signal even more delays, and second, it's a little odd that Palm is going to debut the new OS on just one device. Launching on a single device is pretty Apple-esque, so we'll cut Rubes some slack on that, even if we don't think it's the best idea -- but at this point the only real info we're hearing about Palm OS II is news of delays, and that's not exactly out of the Jobs playbook -- remember, real artists ship.
WSJ Confirms Palm layoffs amidst Rubenstein reorg
In a piece carried by the Wall Street Journal detailing the Jon Rubinstein-era shake-up at Palm, we get the first confirmation of Wednesday's layoff rumor. According to the WSJ, "Yesterday, Palm made some reassignments and staff reductions." The article does not cite specific numbers. Regardless, our hearts go out to those who received this unfortunately timed news. Given Palm's long, steady trudge towards obscurity, couldn't this have waited just a few more weeks? Read [subscription required]
