Palm announced Monday that AT&T has agreed to carry its Pre and Pixi smartphones, while at the same time, rumors have begun to spread that the company is low on cash, and could be near bankruptcy.
The Pre was originally available only on Sprint’s network, but was added to Verizon earlier this year. AT&T added availability will mean that Palm has access to most of the wireless customers in the U.S.
The company said the Pre would be priced at $149.99 with a two year contract, while the Pixi will be priced at $49.99, but both prices are after a $100 mail-in rebate.
Today’s AT&T announcement was enough to advance shares in Palm. In early afternoon trading on Monday, the stock was trading at US$4.13, a gain of $0.1275 (+3.19%), on very strong volume, but Peter Misek of Canaccord Adams lowered his price target for the stock to $0.
[Correction: The story originally included a note that Palm had announced plans to halt production of the Pre and Pixi while it worked to sell existing inventory of the devices. American Banking News retracted that story, and our article was corrected accordingly. - Editor]