HP Still Has No Clue What to do with webOS
HP held a company wide meeting on Tuesday, to tell workers… well, absolutely nothing. In the meeting, HP CEO Meg Whitman told employees that the company still does not know what it is going to do with webOS, and that a decision will not be finalized for another three to four weeks.
“It’s really important to me to make the right decision, not the fast decision,” Whitman told employees. “If HP decides to do this, we’re going to do it in a very significant way, over a multiyear period. It’s a very expensive proposition, but HP can make that bet.”
This announcement, while revealing nothing, is still slightly surprising because it does indicate that HP is considering keeping webOS, rather than selling it off to the highest bidder.
Although it has received a great amount of praise for its interface and garnered many fans, webOS has been neglected in the past by both Palm and HP, preventing the OS from keeping up with rival operating systems from Google, Apple, and Microsoft.
Of course, the subtext here is that HP paid far too much for webOS and has yet to receive a suitable offer. The company may be stuck with the operating system, which is potentially good news for those of you who are fans of webOS – provided HP is up to the task of reviving it.
If HP sticks with webOS, it seems that the operating system may find its way onto tablets. During the company meeting, Whitman focused primarily on tablets, proclaiming that “things get more complicated when you add in phones.” This is another surprising move, considering that HP killed the TouchPad less than two months after it was released. Does HP even have the innovation or creativity to give WebOS the attention that it deserves? Not in my opinion. Not after all of HP’s recent failures. It’s time to sell webOS, or put it to bed for good – a better fate than trying to once again resurrect an already mangled destined-for-destruction operating system.
[via The Verge]