Palm gets another purported buyer

Palm saw its shares spike on Friday after another Taiwan rumor of a potential buyer. Local publication UDN claimed that HTC has been deep in talks to possibly buy the American company and has seen its CEO, Peter Chou, spend just five days in his native Taiwan over the past three weeks.

The move would be possible through Palm's financial woes, which through continued losses has been reduced to under a tenth of HTC's value, or $779 million.

Neither company would either confirm or deny the rumor, although Palm chief Jon Rubinstein has previously said in fiscal results calls that his company would be open to being bought out if it receives a meaningful offer.

The rumor follows just days after one of a possible Lenovo deal but would be an even greater upheaval of the smartphone market. HTC has a much larger presence in smartphones and has been one of the key supporters of both Android and Windows Mobile. Acquiring Palm would give it an in-house mobile OS of its own and could significantly raise the standing of webOS, which has dropped in market share as Android has lured customers away.

It would also potentially give HTC Palm's technology patents and its techniques for using multi-touch, which could mitigate the results of the ongoing Apple lawsuit.

By Electronista Staff

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