HP is reportedly planning to introduce a netbook running Palm's WebOS, in addition to tablets and smartphones.
Hewlett-Packard
is expected to soon introduce a tablet running WebOS, as well as a smartphone.
But a netbook? According to Jan. 17 report from Ars Technica, netbooks are
among the planned HP devices that will not only run the company's prized new
mobile OS, but will seamlessly interact.
HP
reportedly includes netbooks in a discovered set of training materials that it
developed to help educate its mobile carriers' salespeople, according to the
tech site.
"One
of the advantages of WebOS that is briefly highlighted in the training is the
platform's ability to run on multiple devices that can easily communicate with
each other over the Internet," writes Ars Technica. "The specific
form factors listed in the training are phones, tablets and netbooks."
On
Jan. 5 HP sent out invitations to members of the press, inviting them to an
event Feb. 9. Besides including a WebOS announcement, the invitation offered
few details about the event, beyond the teaser line: "Think big. Think
small. Think beyond." This prompted speculation that HP perhaps plans to
show off tablets of various sizes, or additionally a number of form factors.
Speaking to CNBC interviewer Maria Bartiromo at the 2011 Consumer
Electronics Show Jan. 7, HP Executive Vice President Todd Bradley confirmed
that a variety of WebOS-running form factors are planned-at one point even
seeming to suggest that a television is in the works.
"It's
the only true multitasking operating system, where you actually can have 20
different applications open simultaneously," Bradley told Bartiromo. "So
as we think about how that enables everything from smartphones to tablets to
PCs to potentially other large-screen devices"-and here he spread his
hands apart quite wide-"we see an enormous opportunity for both ourselves
and our customers to get the best Web experience, the best content experience
that they can."
Bradley
added that WebOS was HP's "strategic reason" for its $1.2 billion
purchase of smartphone maker Palm in mid-2010-a fact of which HP has made no
secret. In a July 1, 2010,
statement announcing the completion of the acquisition, Bradley said the
purchase would enable Palm to "participate more aggressively in the highly
profitable, $100 billion smartphone and connected mobile devices markets."
He added that with WebOS, HP planned to deliver "a unique and compelling
experience across smartphones and other products."
These
products, however, have been slower to come to market than expected, and even
as late as December 2009, Jon Rubinstein, the former CEO
of Palm and the man now in charge of the Palm brand for HP, would only offer a
vague "early 2011" as a time frame. Since HP first hinted at a fleet
of WebOS-running devices, a number of competitors have already introduced
tablets-including,
most notably, Samsung.
By
Bradley's count, 96 tablets were on display at CES, which prompted Bartiromo to
suggest that a lot of vendors were "playing catch-up to the Apple iPad"-the
device that created the media tablet market-and ask how HP plans to compete.
"You
and I will talk about that on the 9th," answered Bradley.
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