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HP Considering Licensing WebOS, Samsung Reportedly Interested

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Apr 12, 2001
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Bloomberg reports that HP has expressed interest in licensing its webOS mobile operating system to other companies, potentially opening the door for another major competitor in the smartphone and tablet industries.
"We are talking to a number of companies," Apotheker said in Beijing, declining to elaborate on details. "I can share with you that a number of companies have expressed interest. We are continuing our conversations."
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The webOS operating system was originally developed by Palm as an answer to iOS, but was not able to gain much ground against Apple's platform and Google's Android. With HP's acquisition of Palm last year, webOS has undergone a transition as HP has attempted to move directly into the smartphone and tablet markets. HP is launching its TouchPad tablet device within the next few days, and has been said to be trying to launch its own cloud-based media service similar in some respects to Apple's iCloud.

webos_apps.jpg



According to the Bloomberg report, Samsung is one of the companies interested in licensing webOS, presenting an alternative to the Android-based systems currently offered by the manufacturer.
A partnership with HP would allow Samsung, which uses Android for its Galaxy Tab tablet computers, to customize devices amid speculation that Google may restrict modifications for phones that use Android, said one of the people, who declined to be named because the talks are private.
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If HP is able to find success with its new mobile products and Samsung adopts webOS as a leading platform for its own devices, the mobile industry could see a shakeup with webOS becoming a legitimate contender in the race to compete with iOS and Android.

Microsoft has of course been pushing its own Windows Phone operating system as yet another competitive platform, although customer adoption has appeared weak thus far. The company has, however, partnered with Nokia in a deal to drive that manufacturer's future hardware, a deal that could make Windows Phone another major player if customers embrace the platform.

Article Link: HP Considering Licensing WebOS, Samsung Reportedly Interested
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/29/hp-considering-licensing-webos-samsung-reportedly-interested/
I'd love for all 4 OS's to be mainstream players, no matter how unlikely. It would be fun to see each major update and all the hardware try to compete.
 
I like how much this post shows that Samsung doesn't get it.

By splintering WebOS, they will lose a lot of their advantage since it will lead to app incompatibility and the rest… The same thing happening to Android is why Google pulled back.
 
I love my iPad2. However, I think this is good. It might be a real competitor to drive some competition in the industry.

I was a palm user all the way from the Pilot -> Treo. While I know the current Palm/HP has no resemblance to the original company, I have a soft spot in my heart for palm.

Heck, is there anyway to get Graffiti on an iPhone? My note taking ability would go through the roof. I can probably write faster using graffiti than with a pencil and paper.
 
I love webOS, but I hate the old plastic hardware it's on to death. This would interest me as well...
 
akatsuki said:
I like how much this post shows that Samsung doesn't get it.

By splintering WebOS, they will lose a lot of their advantage since it will lead to app incompatibility and the rest… The same thing happening to Android is why Google pulled back.
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I disagree. Licensing does not equal Open Source (or Google's pseudo open source). By licensing their OS they can work with the hardware manufactures to ensure some consistency. They will be able to exercise more control than Google has in the Android market.

Apple is running some version of the iOS on many different devices. iTV, iPad 1 & 2 (some with 3g), iPhone 3g, 3gs, 4 (att/verizon). I think HP's OS has some potential.

HP is the closest company to competing with Apple in the tablet market. Their tablet success will led their OS to get into more smart phones as well.
 
Well there goes WebOS.

The whole point was to *not* license it. To CONTROL the experience. HP had an amazing opportunity here to play Apple's game and perhaps get a taste of what it's like to pursue excellence.

For a moment there I thought "yes, HP gets it."

Oh well.

Licensing doesn't mean open source - at least no be definition. But it will certainly look and fee that way. We all know and have seen the results of licensing. Once you open the door to that, it evenutally becomes unviersal, watered-down, and a coimplete mess. Once the other box-makers and teclos have their way you're pretty much ****ed.
 
I'm thoroughly excited about the possibilities here.

I'm thoroughly fearful of this turning into an Android fragmentation issue...
 
THANK GOODNESS!
HP/Palm hardware is rubbish. If they can't figure out how to make the hardware better, then they are better off just licensing the OS. Everyone likes webOS, so Palm would be pretty successful if they put some effort into it. This has potential. Better hardware, more apps, etc.
 
App Icons on different OS's

Users need to be wary of Apps with nice icons mimicking iOS.

I see where icons will be trademarks for Apps. I don't know that they aren't now because so many App icons look like some other App with only slight differences.

The issue of trademarks is to avoid confusion :confused:

Are we at the point of confusion yet?

Apps usually don't run the same on different OS's so the icon does not represent THE app - only a version of the app.
 
'HP Considering Licensing WebOS, Samsung Reportedly Interested' ... I'm not.

Anybody else think that this item better belongs in a general technology forum and not in MacRumors?
 
VulchR said:
Anybody else think that this item better belongs in a general technology forum and not in MacRumors?
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It's well known that MacRumors often reports on industry news as it often has implications for Apple and it's competitors.
 
This is absolutely fantastic. I would really like to see WebOS dominate over Android. I am really excited to see that the future of computers won't be dominated by any one or two OSs. Multiple platforms all struggling to be the best will provide the innovation required to keep the industry moving forward.
 
*LTD* said:
Well there goes WebOS.

The whole point was to *not* license it. To CONTROL the experience. HP had an amazing opportunity here to play Apple's game and perhaps get a taste of what it's like to pursue excellence.

For a moment there I thought "yes, HP gets it."

Oh well.

Licesning doesn't mean open source. But we all know and have seen the results of licensing. Once you open the door to that, it evenutally becomes unviersal, watered-down, and a coimplete mess. Once the other box-makers and teclos have their way you're pretty much ****ed.
Click to expand...

You can still keep some 'control' through licensing - all depends on what kind of deal is signed. MS is e.g. maintaining some control over winMob7 phones by requiring certain things (mostly hardware requirements like the 'search button') so that the manufacture is allowed to put winMob7 on the device.
 
0815 said:
You can still keep some 'control' through licensing - all depends on what kind of deal is signed. MS is e.g. maintaining some control over winMob7 phones by requiring certain things so that the manufacture is allowed to put winMob7 on the device.
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This is true.

With that being said, I'm not concerned with 'fragmentation'.
As you said it, WP7 is doing fine.
 
HelveticaNeue said:
This is absolutely fantastic. I would really like to see WebOS dominate over Android.
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Respectfully, no, you don't. What you *really* want to see is for WebOS to be *better* than Android. For that you don't need massive market share, just a better product.

Not controlling the end-to-end experience means you'll get an Android clone. It'll become just as generic as the non-iOS devices.
 
Sony should license it and bring back the Clié brand. That would be interesting. (not necessarily successful though.)

I like the competition, id like to see WebOS doing okay.
 
This sounds like a good idea, minus the part about Samsung customizing the experience. WebOS offers the second best user experience behind iOS and, in my opinion, is more attractive than Android. Palm couldn't compete with Apple's hardware or Android's licensing model. Offering the OS would likely cause much more competition for Google than Apple, but would add another credible player to the mobile market.
 
Played with the tablet last night

HP was throwing a meet-n-greet last night in Toronto and I had a chance to play with the new tablet. I gotta say, it was pretty great.

The task management UI is really light years ahead of my iPhone. Really, it was a fantastic experience to move around the system. Compared to the iPhones "giggly icons", the ability to see small versions of the whole window and move and sort them was great. It was like an even better version of Expose.

There's more to the platform than that, obviously, and HP doesn't have anything like the "ecosystem" of the iWorld. However, they try to make up for this with their 'net neutral systems that supposedly sync with everyone out there. One of my main complaints with my iPhone is that it doesn't sync with my machine at home AND work, which is a real PITA. iCloud may address some of this, but not syncing with things like Facebook. I'm curious to see if this actually works, Ars wasn't too impressed a year ago.

Of course this is HP, so my guess it's going to be completely ignored unless they can find some REAL way to wedge in on the enterprise side. RIM certainly didn't.
 
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