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HP CEO: "We didn't buy Palm to be in the smartphone business"
You'd think spending a billion dollars on a smartphone company would indicate a desire to, say, make and sell smartphones, but you'd apparently be thinking wrong: HP CEO Mark Hurd just told investors at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch tech conference that his company "didn't buy Palm to be in the smartphone business," and that he's not going to "spend billions of dollars trying to go into the smartphone business; that doesn't in any way make any sense." Yes, that sound you're hearing is Jon Rubinstein's heart breaking into a million tiny pieces. According to Hurd, HP was actually more interested in Palm's IP -- specifically webOS, which he wants to put on "tens of millions of HP small form-factor web-connected devices." Sure, that makes sense, and it lines up perfectly with HP's plan to "double down on webOS" and put it on everything from netbooks and slates to printers, but hey, Mark? You should really look into the smartphone business when you get a second, okay? Just trust us on this one. We didn't buy Palm to be in the smartphone business. And I tell people that, but it doesn't seem to resonate well. We bought it for the IP. The WebOS is one of the two ground-up pieces of software that is built as a web operating environment...We have tens of millions of HP small form factor web-connected devices...Now imagine that being a web-connected environment where now you can get a common look and feel and a common set of services laid against that environment. That is a very value proposition. [Thanks, Steve]
Wii will cost $200 say spectators
Nintendo Wii will launch at $200 in an attempt to undercut the competition, says an analyst at Merrill Lynch. An executive from SEGA goes further, suggesting that Wii will launch for under $200. This latest estimate sits in the middle of previous ones, but taken in the context of past console releases a $200 launch price wouldn't be out of character for Nintendo. The NES, SNES, Nintendo 64 and GameCube all launched at a price point of $200, so we wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo throws up their hands and says "why mess with tradition?"With the PS3's price confirmed, Nintendo's console is the last of the next-generation consoles to get a solid release price so it's natural that fans and analysts alike will continue the guessing game. As for the other type of price guessing game -- how much the Wii (PS3, Xbox 360) costs to make -- no-one has stepped up to the task just yet.[Via /.]
