Treo Launch Pushed Back
Handspring announced last week that its long-awaited Treo device will have corporate e-mail service by midyear, but that the first version wont have always-on capabilities.
Treo, which combines a personal digital assistant, cell phone and pager, will be available to U.S. customers next month via the companys Web site. It should be in retail stores by March. This is slightly later than the original launch date. Officials blamed the delay on the shortage of “a component” but would not be specific.
They also said the e-mail service for the Treo will be similar to that of Research In Motions BlackBerry device, which features an always-on capability. But because the Treo works on Global System for Mobile Communications, a circuit-switched network, the device must make a phone call to do any function. GPRS (General Packet Radio Service), which is packet-switched, can take care of that problem, but officials said they didnt want to wait for the widespread deployment of GPRS before launching the service.