12:49 PM
Paul B
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| Cover via Amazon |
I used to have a Palm Pre which was one of the first platforms with WebOS which was designed to be a competitor to Google's Android, and Apple's iOS. It was also supposed to be the software that saved Palm. It failed and HP bought out Palm a short time later.
Well not everyone has given up on the WebOS platform, and in fact it is coming to an LG TV pretty soon. From Ars:
CNET reports electronics giant LG will acquire webOS from HP to use it for its smart televisions division. But there are no plans for webOS to be integrated into any mobile devices, as LG already has a thriving mobile division with its handsets and Android smartphones.
"It creates a new path for LG to offer an intuitive user experience and Internet services across a range of consumer electronics devices," said Skott Ahn, president and chief technology officer of LG Electronics Inc., as reported by CNET. The deal would give LG the rights to all of the source code for webOS, its documentation and engineers, and all of the related websites, as well as HP’s licenses for use with webOS products and all of the patents HP inherited from Palm. However, HP will hold on to the webOS cloud services division, which includes the app catalog and the backend services that interact with the operating system.
This will be the third major company webOS has fallen under. Its first company, Palm, was bought out by HP for $1.2 billion. Then HP called it quits in August 2011 by discontinuing all webOS-related operations, including the HP TouchPad. The company said back then that it would "continue to explore options to optimize the value of webOS software going forward."What do you think of this news? Think WebOS still has a chance in the competitive touch-screen OS market? Let me know what your think in the comments.
