Hasta La Gadget!

If you’re itching to put a webOS device on your AT&T account and don’t mind having half the now-standard RAM, the developers at jictechnology have released what they’re claiming is an official, permanent SIM unlock for the original Palm Pre. A few bugs to get through, but it’s apparently legitimate enough (we haven’t tried, but the happy customers in the forums seem to suggest success) for the group to charge around £25. Great news all around, but if you’re the sort whose fixation on Palm hasn’t been so grand that you resisted switching to Sprint or Verizon, you can probably wait for the AT&T’s Plus-sized model.

GSM Palm Pre SIM unlock now available, unofficially originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 18 Apr 2010 12:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Just a few days after earning its all-important GFC wings, the European flavor of Palm’s Pixi Plus has caught a jet plane over to the good ol’ US of A where it’s picking up FCC approval — you know, just in case an owner or two ends up deciding to spend some time in the States. Model number P121UEU (as opposed to the AT&T variant, the P121UNA) now has the full blessing of the boys and girls at the Feds — so when you pick up a Pixi Plus from your O2 shop on the next few weeks, take comfort in the knowledge that you won’t be Tased, tackled, and placed under arrest for attempting to use one on American soil. That’s a good thing, we’d reckon.

Palm Pixi Plus for Europe granted student visa, hangs out at FCC HQ originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 17 Apr 2010 05:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Palm’s news activity doesn’t seem like abating any time soon, as the company has just made the Deutsch arrival date for its Plus-ified phones official as April 28. It matches earlier speculation about late April, but also — very importantly — introduces a new carrier options for our Teutonic brethren in the form of Vodafone. Formerly locked in with Telefonica (whose local representative is O2), Palm seems to have finally seen the error of its ways and started offering choice as a side dish to its delectable WebOS main course. So, forget about who’s buying the company, will you be buying its phones?

[Thanks, gizmo21]

Official: Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus hitting Vodafone and O2 Germany on April 28 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 13 Apr 2010 06:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Although we’ve got the feeling that Palm will eventually be sold off, apparently that’s not the only option on the table: Reuters and Street Insider have followed up last night’s news that Palm is up for sale with some more details, including the revelations that Cisco is an interested buyer and Palm is also considering licensing webOS and / or seeking an additional infusion of cash from an outside investor. We’re at all sure who’d be willing to join Bono’s Elevation Partners in pumping more cash into Palm as it stands right now, but we can certainly see the company loosening the strings and licensing webOS to other manufacturers, something it did with great success back in the Palm OS days. Of course, that success eventually led to a string of terrible business decisions and the brink of failure, from upon which Palm has never returned, but hey — at least it’s familiar territory, right? Sigh.

In other news, Palm CTO Mitch Allen is scheduled to talk about Palm’s patent strategy next month, and the press release announcing his talk straight-up values the company’s IP portfolio at $8-$9 a share, or around a billion and a half dollars. If that’s true, it means anyone buying Palm at today’s closing price and market cap of $6 and $1.01b would be getting a nice little discount — which is probably why bids are expected to come in this week. We’ll see what goes down; it looks like most of you agree with us that HTC would be a terrific match here, but anything can happen. Stay tuned.

Palm also looking at licensing webOS and / or finding new investors originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Apr 2010 17:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Uh, whoa. Bloomberg just reported that Palm is putting itself up for sale and that offers will potentially come in this week. That’s pretty wild news, considering CEO Jon Rubinstein was adamant just a few days ago that Palm had a plan to get profitable — even while his company’s stock price went on a buyout-rumor fueled rollercoaster. Bloomberg says that Palm’s already retained Goldman Sachs and Qatalyst Partners to find a buyer, with HTC (yes!) and Lenovo both expressing interest — and Dell’s apparently already taken a pass. Naturally none of these parties are saying anything on the record — we just pinged Palm and they declined comment — but if this is true, things are about to get wild, and fast. We’ll keep you updated, stay tuned.

[Thanks, Sean]

Bloomberg: Palm is up for sale originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 11 Apr 2010 23:38:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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