Wednesday, December 21, 2005
NTT DoCoMo Increases It's Stake In PalmOS Owner Access To 11.66%
Posted by Ed Hansberry in "NEWS" @ 02:00 PM
http://mobileopportunity.blogspot.com/2005/12/ntt-docomo-buys-1166-of-palm-os-watch.html
Many of you remember Michael Mace, the CCO, or Chief Competitive Officer of Palm, Inc. and then PalmSource, Inc. when that was spun off. He is no longer with either but he is keeping tabs on the mobile device space. He has set up a blog and has some comments on NTT DoCoMo's recent purchase of 11.66% of PalmOS, which was announced back in November. He titles the post "NTT DoCoMo buys 11.66% of Palm OS. Watch this space" but that isn't accurate. NTT DoCoMo already owned 7.12% of Access, the company that purchased PalmSource earlier this year. They have increased that to 11.66%.
"It's possible that the DoCoMo investment has nothing to do with Palm OS or Linux. Access provides the browser for a lot of DoCoMo phones, and it frequently subsidizes suppliers in various ways for custom development. But DoCoMo paid about $120 million, which is a lot for just customizing a browser… DoCoMo is a strong supporter of mobile Linux for 3G phones, and you have to assume that Access is in there pitching its upcoming OS. I can just picture the conversation: "You already get the browser from us, why don't we just bundle it with the OS for one nice low fee?" Meanwhile, Panasonic just dropped Symbian and plans to refocus all its phone development on 3G phones and mobile Linux. You have to figure Access is talking to them as well."
Of course, I thought $324 million was a lot for PalmSource, so $120 million for a 5% increase in their stake of a browser doesn't strike me as terribly odd, i.e. they are both overpriced. I really think this has more to do with a proprietary phone that is common in Japan than an operating system like PalmOS that is a platform for a PDA style device that is connected, like a Treo.
Many of you remember Michael Mace, the CCO, or Chief Competitive Officer of Palm, Inc. and then PalmSource, Inc. when that was spun off. He is no longer with either but he is keeping tabs on the mobile device space. He has set up a blog and has some comments on NTT DoCoMo's recent purchase of 11.66% of PalmOS, which was announced back in November. He titles the post "NTT DoCoMo buys 11.66% of Palm OS. Watch this space" but that isn't accurate. NTT DoCoMo already owned 7.12% of Access, the company that purchased PalmSource earlier this year. They have increased that to 11.66%.
"It's possible that the DoCoMo investment has nothing to do with Palm OS or Linux. Access provides the browser for a lot of DoCoMo phones, and it frequently subsidizes suppliers in various ways for custom development. But DoCoMo paid about $120 million, which is a lot for just customizing a browser… DoCoMo is a strong supporter of mobile Linux for 3G phones, and you have to assume that Access is in there pitching its upcoming OS. I can just picture the conversation: "You already get the browser from us, why don't we just bundle it with the OS for one nice low fee?" Meanwhile, Panasonic just dropped Symbian and plans to refocus all its phone development on 3G phones and mobile Linux. You have to figure Access is talking to them as well."
Of course, I thought $324 million was a lot for PalmSource, so $120 million for a 5% increase in their stake of a browser doesn't strike me as terribly odd, i.e. they are both overpriced. I really think this has more to do with a proprietary phone that is common in Japan than an operating system like PalmOS that is a platform for a PDA style device that is connected, like a Treo.
