Who knew? Palm cut the price of the Centro to $99 and they sell millions. Literally!Palm hit a milestone today: two million Palm Centros sold since the Palm OS smartphone was introduced. In fact, they hit the one million milestone just a few short months ago. Amazing and a good example of why price does matter in mobile technology. Actually, it's two million examples, but why nitpick?Here's a smartphone that you won't pay over $99 for after the standard two-year commitment and subsidy. In fact, I've seen the device on sale at brick-and-mortar retailers for as little as $49. A year or two ago if you had said to me "I think we'll see a full-featured smartphone for under $100", I would said "You're right, but what year do expect to see that in: 2010 or 2011?"
Why raise the "price matters" argument? Because it emphasizes the backwards trend we're witnessing in the netbook market. Even the original $200 Asus became a $399 device for most... new models are even higher and that's going to hurt consumer adoption to a degree. Congrats to Palm, however. They take a fair amount of ribbing on their product line these days, but you have to give them credit: they not only saw the potential for a low-cost smartphone, they got such a product to market. Two million of them to be precise.
3 comments:
The Centro: Palm's last gasp
effay...jump in on the dogpile all you want, but the centro, combined with chatter email, is one bad ass communication device that easily rivals a blackberry (disclaimer: while I am a tech geek, and have several friends who have blackberries, I do not have and have not extensively used one myself), and certainly seems to get more things done more efficiently than an iPhone...except for doing it as slickly, which I concur is an aspect.
The centro seems to be loads better than my current 700p, and coupled with sprint SERO plans, presents by FAR the best mobile communications options in mobile services today, in terms of cost vs. capabilities. For $30/mo, plus applicable taxes, you can get 500 daytime minutes, unlimited nights/wkends (starting at 7), unlimited texts, and unlimited (up to 5gb...but nobody is truly unlimited that i know of, and good luck hitting 5gb with a mobile phone, even using occasional tethering--coughcoughUSBMODEMcoughcough--on your plan) internet/data. with chatter, and an applicable IMAP email address (like gmail), you get email pushed to your phone within seconds of receipt. beat that...just try to anywhere else. I've been looking, and I can't.
That all said...If I could get comparable AT&T service for anywhere CLOSE to what I'm paying for sprint (as compared to ~2x+ the cost), I'd be there in a heartbeat, even paying full non-subsidized price for an iPhone.
I own a Centro.
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