VisorCentral.com - Handspring still an A

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-- Handspring still an A (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/showthread.php?threadid=24777)

Posted by Toby on 07-15-2002 02:28 AM:

Re: And the TREO is earth-shattering

quote:
Originally posted by coppertop
My modules won't be worth a flip and there will not be any development for new modules seeing that HS dumped the Visor.

Your modules should work as long as you have your current Visor.

quote:
You act like the TREO is the best thing since sliced bread.

I never mentioned the Treo, nor did anyone else. I have no use for them personally.

quote:
Well it ain't and HS will be either bought out or belly up within 6 months.

That's quite possible, but it _still_ has nothing to do with the topic at hand.

Posted by argent on 07-15-2002 03:00 AM:

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007
HS MAY be doing something foolish with their shift in focus- but I think it would be far more foolish for them to continue to compete head-on against Palm and Sony.

They've been doing very well against Palm and Sony, and have lost market share since they decided to take on Nokia and the other cellphone manyfacturers instead.

And in any case, the Visor is a unique product, it filled a niche that nothing else did or does today... the only device that had a chance of doing so was the Jornada 568 with its CF Ie expansion slot (which allows bulky expansion modules that are still solidly attached to the unit), but that's been plowed under.

__________________
Rev. Peter da Silva, ULC<br>
<a href=http://www.taronga.com/~peter/>Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?</a>

Posted by VancouverCanuck on 07-16-2002 08:07 AM:

Re: Re: Your a pretty good cheerleader for HS

quote:
Originally posted by Toby
Admit it, you're missing the point. Handspring has turned their back on the Springboard enthusiasts. The catch is that those enthusiasts are a) irrelevant to Joe Consumer, and b) irrelevant to the topic at hand. If you want to be pissed at Handspring for leaving you with six modules which will probably be useless to you in the near future, that's fine. However, it's totally irrelevant to a service and reliability rating from _general_consumers_ who probably _never_ bought a module (unless it was a backup or memory module).

Give him a break. A lot of us ex-Visor supporters are pigouhed because the Springboard was supposed to be the very reason for Handspring's tossing their hat into the ring in the first place. And it ain't anymore. (If you remember Donna Dubinsky on CNN showing off the Eyemodule back in 99 or 00, you'll appreciate what I'm talking about.) And the fact that Dubinsky and Hawkins were behind it made a lot of people sit up and take notice.

They haven't been supporting Springboard fans in any way, shape, or form since the Edge came out over a year ago. The captains have abandoned ship, and some of us are still pretty damn bitter.

My two cents...Do with it what you will.

Posted by Toby on 07-16-2002 12:21 PM:

Re: Re: Re: Your a pretty good cheerleader for HS

quote:
Originally posted by VancouverCanuck
Give him a break.

Why?

quote:
A lot of us ex-Visor supporters are pigouhed because the Springboard was supposed to be the very reason for Handspring's tossing their hat into the ring in the first place. And it ain't anymore. (If you remember Donna Dubinsky on CNN showing off the Eyemodule back in 99 or 00, you'll appreciate what I'm talking about.) And the fact that Dubinsky and Hawkins were behind it made a lot of people sit up and take notice.

I know exactly what you're talking about, and it's still wholly irrelevant to the topic at hand.

quote:
They haven't been supporting Springboard fans in any way, shape, or form since the Edge came out over a year ago. The captains have abandoned ship, and some of us are still pretty damn bitter.

Feel free to be bitter all you want, but ignoring reality and trying to miscategorize what other people are saying is going to get you _nowhere_. Start a new thread and rant to your heart's content about how pissed off you are at Handspring (actually, I think a couple exist already). However, don't rant about it where it has _no_ relevance and then start throwing straw men about.

quote:
My two cents...Do with it what you will.

No thanks. I'm trying to get rid of the couple Canadian pennies I get slipped into my change every once in a while already.

Posted by dampeoples on 07-16-2002 03:41 PM:

Re: Re: Re: Re: Your a pretty good cheerleader for HS

quote:
Originally posted by Toby
Why?[B]Start a new thread and rant to your heart's content about how pissed off you are at Handspring (actually, I think a couple exist already).

Just a couple 'eh

Posted by Toby on 07-16-2002 04:15 PM:

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Your a pretty good cheerleader for HS

quote:
Originally posted by dampeoples
Just a couple 'eh

I meant _this_ week.

Posted by Madkins007 on 07-16-2002 04:39 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by argent
They've been doing very well against Palm and Sony, and have lost market share since they decided to take on Nokia and the other cellphone manyfacturers instead.

And in any case, the Visor is a unique product, it filled a niche that nothing else did or does today... the only device that had a chance of doing so was the Jornada 568 with its CF Ie expansion slot (which allows bulky expansion modules that are still solidly attached to the unit), but that's been plowed under.

If HS was doing OK, then why did Sony become #2 in this market? Personally, I think that if Palm did not have the low-end pretty much locked up then Sony might be #1 by now.

If HS's expandability was THE main innovation, why did most users never buy a module?

My main question here is exactly who abandoned who? HS is just responding to the real market out there- the market where almost no one buys modules, where fewer and fewer proportioanlly are buying PDAs at all- and those that do are buying cheap Palms or color Sonys.

I love Handspring, and love the Solo and Neo my wife and kids use, and I loved my Deluxe and Prism. I hope HS thrives... but it is pretty obvious that they will not do so if they do not develop new markets- and that is exactly what they are trying to do.

__________________
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are at!

Posted by Toby on 07-16-2002 04:53 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007
If HS was doing OK, then why did Sony become #2 in this market? [...]

Read his post more closely. Sony became number 2 basically because Handspring took itself out of the market. Sony's marketshare has not changed much. Palm has gained marketshare since Handspring's has dropped (which is expected if they've reduced their offerings in that market).

Posted by argent on 07-16-2002 05:14 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007
If HS was doing OK, then why did Sony become #2 in this market? Personally, I think that if Palm did not have the low-end pretty much locked up then Sony might be #1 by now.

Toby has covered the first part, but I will note that Sony's first device was targeted at the low end market and quite successful. Sony's main weakness is internal incompatibility: you can't buy peripherals for a lot of Clie' models because they have different hotsync ports.

quote:
If HS's expandability was THE main innovation, why did most users never buy a module?

Setting aside the question of whether that's true, they bought the *option* of buying a module. For a long time (possibly still) most Palm users didn't download any software, they still bought the option of doing so, and the ones that do have been more than enough to make the Palm software market 10 times the size of the Pocket PC one.

quote:
My main question here is exactly who abandoned who? HS is just responding to the real market out there- the market where almost no one buys modules, where fewer and fewer proportioanlly are buying PDAs at all- and those that do are buying cheap Palms or color Sonys.

Until Donna Dubinsky revealed that they were dropping the Visor, people were buying more Visors than Sonys. the drop in market share, as Toby points out, came later... causes do not come after effects, effects come after causes.

quote:
I hope HS thrives... but it is pretty obvious that they will not do so if they do not develop new markets- and that is exactly what they are trying to do.

Developing new markets does not imply abandoning old ones. Putting all your eggs in one basket, whether it's the Visor or the Treo, is just asking for the foulup fairy to wave her wand and turn all your golden eggs into rotten apples.

__________________
Rev. Peter da Silva, ULC<br>
<a href=http://www.taronga.com/~peter/>Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?</a>

Posted by Madkins007 on 07-17-2002 04:46 PM:

Donna's announcement was not heard by 90% of the PDA users in the world. I doubt highly it directly affected HS or the PDA market in general. HS was already doing worse before the announcement was made as is reflected in several of the old threads from before her comments.

The idea that most HS users do not/did not buy a module came from conversations I have had with a couple module makers and is obvious by simply looking at the sales of modules compared to the sales of the devices, and paying attention in the streets.

"Developing new markets does not imply abandoning old ones." Well...

a.) Yes, it does if you are a smaller company with a weak financial outlook. You simply cannot afford to maintain too many product lines or marketing fronts at once.

b.) Ceasing production of out-of-date technology is not the same as 'abandoning' it. HS has stated that it will support older Visors as long as it can, and it is not HS that is stopping the manufacture of modules.

c.) If you are refering to supporting the Springboard then we are back to the question of whether or not it was a commercial success. I think the Springboard is really great, but it appears the market as a whole disagrees.

(on a side note, I am also a ULC minister- small world!)

__________________
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are at!

Posted by Toby on 07-17-2002 05:15 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007
Donna's announcement was not heard by 90% of the PDA users in the world.

It didn't need to be. All it needed to be heard by were corporates in the major retailers. You don't think they keep track of those things?

quote:
I doubt highly it directly affected HS or the PDA market in general.

It directly affected the retailers and their strategies for selling the things, don't you think?

quote:
HS was already doing worse before the announcement was made as is reflected in several of the old threads from before her comments.

Doing worse where? They were still holding strong in second place in the market, and their stock price had been recovering nicely.

quote:
[...] (on a side note, I am also a ULC minister- small world!)

ditto

Posted by argent on 07-17-2002 05:18 PM:

Donna's quote was followed very quickly by Office Depot dumping the visor. That kind of thing IS noticed by consumers/

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007

"Developing new markets does not imply abandoning old ones." Well...

a.) Yes, it does if you are a smaller company with a weak financial outlook. You simply cannot afford to maintain too many product lines or marketing fronts at once.

You also can't afford to maintain too few product lines.

quote:
b.) Ceasing production of out-of-date technology is not the same as 'abandoning' it.

This assumes the existing visors are somehow "out of date technology".

quote:
c.) If you are refering to supporting the Springboard then we are back to the question of whether or not it was a commercial success.

The question is whether the visor/Springboard combo is a success. And I think the market definitely says "yes". If the Visor had just been a generic Palm clone with no expansion possibilities Handspring would never have reached the point where they were selling more Visors than all the Pocket PC manufacturers TOGETHER were selling Pocket PCs. Whether Springboard manufacturers predicted greater sales than in fact happened, that's another matter. I think a lot of the sales problems were their faults. I was set to buy an MP3 module as soon as I could use the MP3 module's memory from the Visor. That never happened... and what's the point of buying an MP3 module I'd have to use as a separate independent usint most of the time because I was using my module slot for other things? I might as well use a separate player.

The eyemodule suffered from low resolution, *plus* if you went to their web page using the browser on ANY handheld you got told to get IE4 or greater!

The most useful modules were multifunction (thincomm realised this first: if you had extra flash let the user use it? why not, what does it hurt, and handspring eventually provided the file mover in the module devkit!). Memory modules were common, yes, but the problem was that you had a choice of memory or I/O. Handspring should have upped the RAM to 16M in the Platinum and Prism, and then there wouldn't have been nearly as much need to use memory. They eventually did that with the Pro, and they should have kept that up instead of going haring off after the Treo like a Corgi with ADD.

__________________
Rev. Peter da Silva, ULC<br>
<a href=http://www.taronga.com/~peter/>Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?</a>

Posted by Madkins007 on 07-18-2002 05:18 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Toby
Doing worse where? They were still holding strong in second place in the market, and their stock price had been recovering nicely.[B]ditto

www.marketwatch.com shows that they were having a strong November/December- Christmas season, but the two-year view shows that the 'rally' was barely a blip on the screen- about 1/2 of where they were April 2001 as they continued on a long, relatively steady decline.

I DID note that there was a sharp decrease in their stock right after Donna's Jan. 15th announcement, so it had THAT affect, but my argument was that her announcement did not affect the average BUYER/USER's opinion of the product.

Of course- the decline is probably also at least partly due to declining sales after the Christmas rush. Either way- her timing stunk! (A small rally later might have been because of Jeff's follow-up comments).

I have been trying to find some actual sales figures for Deluxes, Prisms, Sonys, and modules so I could put some hard data behind what I have been told, and can't seem to locate this- anyone have any ideas where to look?

(Toby- you are ULC too? "As the world shrinks!")

__________________
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are at!

Posted by Toby on 07-18-2002 05:35 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Madkins007
www.marketwatch.com shows that they were having a strong November/December- Christmas season,

This was strongly correlated to the Treo announcement.

quote:
but the two-year view shows that the 'rally' was barely a blip on the screen- about 1/2 of where they were April 2001 as they continued on a long, relatively steady decline.

The insane high after the IPO was actually a more irrelevant 'blip' considering the performance of the company. They had nowhere to go _but_ down.

quote:
I DID note that there was a sharp decrease in their stock right after Donna's Jan. 15th announcement, so it had THAT affect, but my argument was that her announcement did not affect the average BUYER/USER's opinion of the product.

Doesn't matter. If it affected the _real_ buyers (the ones that stock the shelves with products), that's where the hurt's going to be put on. If the average BUYER/USER can't find the thing in a store, or sees all of them being clearanced and asks why and is told "the manufacturer is discontinuing them", you think they're going to care if Handspring intends to produce them as long as there's demand?

quote:
Of course- the decline is probably also at least partly due to declining sales after the Christmas rush.

Who buys or sells stock like that?

quote:
I have been trying to find some actual sales figures for Deluxes, Prisms, Sonys, and modules so I could put some hard data behind what I have been told, and can't seem to locate this- anyone have any ideas where to look?

NPDIntellect? Gartner? Retailers' corporate HQs?

quote:
(Toby- you are ULC too? "As the world shrinks!")

It's miniscule.

Posted by argent on 07-18-2002 06:01 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by Toby
[the strong Christmas season] ... was strongly correlated to the Treo announcement.

It's also correlated to the strong sales before the Christmas season. Handspring had strong sales from early on (in fact it was much stronger than they planned for and they had problems meeting supply). The strong Christmas season was part of the same trend... it's the dramatic downturn *after* that that's the surprise, and that's all after the Treo announcement.

__________________
Rev. Peter da Silva, ULC<br>
<a href=http://www.taronga.com/~peter/>Ar rug t� barr�g ar do mhact�re inniu?</a>

Posted by Toby on 07-18-2002 06:56 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by argent
It's also correlated to the strong sales before the Christmas season. Handspring had strong sales from early on (in fact it was much stronger than they planned for and they had problems meeting supply). The strong Christmas season was part of the same trend... it's the dramatic downturn *after* that that's the surprise, and that's all after the Treo announcement.

I think we're talking about two different things. You seem to be talking about sales (and I don't disagree with your point). I was referring to stock price. A dramatic downturn in stock price after the Christmas season would be _extremely_ unusual just due to a downturn in sales after the Christmas season. After all, retailers experience that sort of thing all the time, and you don't normally see retailers' stock prices tumbling every January when they hit a post-Christmas slump. Stock price tumbles like that usually result from massive profit-taking (which seems unlikely for HAND, although it could have been massive loss reduction

) or a sudden loss of confidence in the company's future. Hmm...wonder what could cause that.

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