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TMO Reports - Sony Ends Clie Line of Palm-Based PDAs

by , 10:00 AM EST, February 22nd, 2005

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Sony Corp. will end production of its Palm-based line of Clié personal digital assistants (PDA) in July, the Japanese-language Web site Impress reported Tuesday. The company said it would leave open the possibility of working in the future on joint ventures with other companies.

The announcement comes nine months after the company said it would no longer sell new models outside of Japan and would reassess the future of its PDA line.

The company won't be launching any new Clié PDAs in Japan but will continue to offer service and support for its users, a spokesperson told Impress.

The company said it would not be leaving the PDA business entirely, but would possibly partner with others to create hybrid PDAs and cellular phones, such as Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB.

Analysts: No surprise

Sony's departure from the stand-alone PDA market is little surprise to analysts who have seen demand for PDAs wane and use of cellular phones with PDA-like features grow.

"Leaving the U.S. market and selling its PDAs just in Japan meant Sony had little of chance to grow its sales," said Steve Baker, an analyst with NPD. "Given the popularity of the cellular phone in Japan, I think it had little chance to survive."

The announcement comes as no surprise to Michael Gartenberg, PDA analyst for Jupiter Research, given recent numbers from NPD, who reported Sony's market share had fallen to 10.2% in 2004, compared to 25.7% in the same period a year earlier.

PDA U.S. MARKETSHARE (BY UNITS)*
MANUFACTURER 2003 2004
1. PalmOne 47.8% 64.1%
2. HP 16.5% 21.5%
3. Sony 25.7% 10.2%
(* = Wireless devices, such as the Handspring Treo, are not included in this category.)
Source: NPD Group

"I think what is clear is that their strategy wasn't working," Mr. Gartenberg told The Mac Observer. "Sony's market share has been in somewhat of a decline for a little while now and Sony has brought many innovations for the PDA space, but some of their more recent models may have been too innovative, almost, to the marketplace in terms of what they were attempting to deliver at the high end of the line."

Observer Comments

Show: Subjects Only | Full Comments
Close Name:Dreadnought Posts: 160 Joined: 01 Jan 2005
Subject: It's a pity

The Clie was the best PDA out there - but the upper end were a bit too feature rich and expensive.

View Name:Guest
Subject: OK, For Real...
Close Name:Intruder -   TMO Mac Specialist Posts: 2928 Joined: 07 Jul 2004
Subject: Apple PDAs

Kinda lends creedence to Apple's position regarding (not) entering the PDA market.

PDAs are slowly dying. PDA/cellphone is one area of convergence that makes sense. Cellphone/music player makes less sense (at least to me).

Close Name:Small White Car Posts: 1950 Joined: 02 Jul 2004
Subject: Re: Apple PDAs

Quote
Intruder wrote:
Cellphone/music player makes less sense (at least to me).


Yeah, well I thought "camera/cell phone" was a dumb idea too, and look how popular THAT became.

I still don't know WHY, but there you have it.

Close Name:Ahnyer Keester Posts: 663 Joined: 25 Jun 2001
Subject: End?

Is this the beginning of the end for Palm based PDAs? It seems like WindowsCE has pretty much eclipsed Palm unless they do something very clever very soon.

This is from a Tungsten/T owner.

I just haven't seen significant leading edge advances with Palm in a while. The T5 is nice, but WindowsCE has used that full screen for a long time. I think smartphones and iPods are taking the functionality and what they can't/aren't, the WindowsCE machines are doing a better job than Palm.

Really sad, I love Palm and would have liked to seen it remain dominant.

View Name:Guest
Subject: I Don't Understand the PDA/Phone Combos
Close Name:Mace Posts: 9163 Joined: 07 Aug 2003
Subject:

I am a non-believer in PDA only devices and have not owned one. To me, PDA functions are only good to have and thus should be incorporated into cellphones, iPod and other convergence devices.

We spend most of our times reading(incl surfing), chatting(incl emailing and meeting), listening to music, watching(TV, movies), moving around and sleeping. Any devices that improve productivity of such activity are always wanted.

View Name:Guest
Subject: It's not over yet...
View Name:Guest
Subject: It's not over yet...
Close Name:technoguy100 Posts: 47 Joined: 12 Aug 2004
Subject:

Quote
Ahnyer Keester wrote:
Is this the beginning of the end for Palm based PDAs? It seems like WindowsCE has pretty much eclipsed Palm...


The market share numbers quoted in the article don't seem to back up this statement. PalmOne's market share rose from 47.8% in '03 to 64.1% in '04. The combined PalmOne and Sony market share has been pretty constant at just under 75%. And this doesn't include hot sellers like the PalmOS based Treo. The entire PDA market may be shrinking, but the PalmOS seems to be maintaining its share of that market.

View Name:Guest
Subject: It's not over yet...
View Name:Guest
Subject: Too Bad
View Name:Guest
Subject:
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