Sony Corp. is calling an end to its Clié line of PDAs (personal digital assistants) in Japan, the company said Tuesday. The move comes eight months after the company said it would no longer sell new models of PDAs overseas and puts the cap on a product line first announced by the Tokyo company in mid-2000. Elsewhere, here’s a review of the Fujitsu Siemens Pocket Loox 420.
Sony to end Clie line of PDAs in Japan Too
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Eugenia Loli
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Well, it’s just the next logical step for Sony. When the new cell phones have the same fonctionalities that made the success of the early Palm, there’s no reason for keeping a stucked product line. Sony is now shifting its resources on its alliance with Ericsson on successful products like the T610, S700 and P910. The only problem is for Palm: if the high-end is leaving the business, only the commodity products remain (like the Zire). Where are the margins?
On a side note, after the bankrupty of Be, Inc., Jean-Louis Gassée will now supervise the implosion of Palm. Will “Eliminator” be his next nick name?
Somebody offers JLG an executive position at Microsoft’s OS division?
sony also stopped selling the vgn-u line in the US. hopefully those rumors about a new model coming out in the next few months are true.
This is really sad news. I always liked Sony Clie PDAs, and was quite sad when I heard they were being discontinued in the U.S. Now that they are completely gone I’m really down. Sony made the best Palm OS based PDAs around and brought a lot of cool ideas for the Palm market.
But I can also understand thing as the PDA market seems to be in a constant down spiral with competition coming from many sides, especially cell phones.
I just bought a Treo 650. Has a few quirks but I use it all the time. Does so much.
very sad. I still use my Clie Peg-T415 (ya their model nomenclature was stupid). 4 features I use it mainly for now (used to be 5 – college notetaking but I have a laptop now) those 3 are addy book, e-book reading, word-to go where I keep some notes, and appointment/calendar.
I don’t want my cell phone to be my palm pilot. Make it so it share’s the same address/phone book features for easy synching sure but I don’t want to take my phone to bed with me to read an e-book. The ability to read an e-book with the built-in light is a killer app for me.
I don’t think the sony line did too well compared to other models.(IMHO) Whenever I went to the local tech store, the SONY PDA seemed just stylish, and not like a PDA I like to carry, more like a fashion accessory. I don’t know, It is sad though, less competition, less choice. So the prices will go uP! i prsume, just my ideas.
I must say that I really loved the clie line. I never owned one due to the lack of phone functionality, but if there were a model in the NZ/NX series that could do WiFi, BT and GPRS I would so buy it!
> I don’t want my cell phone to be my palm pilot.
Why not? Price? My last palm was Vx. I waited a few years before entering the pda/phone hybrid market. Treo 650 seemed like a good choice. It really is cool. I don’t think it’s a complete device yet, but I love the combo.
Sony is trying to cut costs and improve profitability.
they can address the same target audiences via phones and the upcomming play station portable. Plus those units have a better chance of remaining profitable.
I am worried for palm source. I don’t the selective licensing model works and we see just how hard it is to compete with MS especially when corporate buyers are involved (the same ones who opt for Windows CE).
Hopefully the rumor of a sony-ericsson Palm OS phone will come true. Hopefully palm will get more licensees in the phone space and from china. In any case Palmsource is walking on thin ice.
i liked em . I guess sony should move more toward smartphones.