Palm kills Foleo

Palm has put an end to the much-maligned Foleo, a "smartphone companion," that resembles a standard laptop and includes a Linux-based operating system, a 416MHz Intel/Marvell processor, and also has a dedicated graphics processor. In a blog message, Palm CEO Ed Colligan said that though the company is "nearly at the point for shipping Foleo," the product was canceleed due to a desire to "offer a single, consistent user experience around this new platform design and a single focus for our platform development efforts." Colligan also admitted that the company would need to enact "a number of improvements to make Foleo a world-class product," and could not afford to make those improvements without losing focus of core products.

In late August, analyst Jonathan Goldberg said that the Foleo had been delayed to late September or early October to combat serious bugs with the miniature Linux computer; including the fact that in many cases the Foleo would not even synchronize properly with most of Palm's own Treo models.

Palm doesn't seem to be giving up on Foleo entirely, however. Colligan's blog entry makes mention of "Foleo II," which will be based on the company's "new platform." He declined to give any specifics on potential shipping dates or explicate on functionality, however.

By Electronista Staff