It really doesn’t matter if Android is “all it’s cracked up to be.” It also doesn’t matter if Microsoft doesn’t like it. Palm isn’t exactly thriving with Microsoft’s Windows Mobile platform (nor is Microsoft, for that matter). Palm is a walking corpse and needs to associate with living, breathing human beings again.
The answer is “Yes.” An emphatic “Yes.”
Fortune writes:
…[I]t may be time for a drastic change of strategy. If Android is all it’s cracked up to be, Palm may be better off scrapping its OS plans, and throwing in with Google instead….
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Fortune makes the suggestion that Palm should focus on Google’s Android mobile operating platform, and then ZDNet follows with a question, “Should Palm drop their Linux plans and embrace Android?”
Certainly, Palm would be taking a risk by betting on Android. Any embrace of Google would bring the wrath of Microsoft, which could make it more difficult for Palm to produce its most profitable handsets, its Windows Mobile-based Treos.
Android lets Palm bet big on the future. Windows Mobile is a bet on an operating system that has failed to make much of a dent on the market in its 10 years of struggling to do so. Palm was right to bet on Linux two years ago, but it has done little with the strategy. It’s time to try its luck with Google. Android is no panacea, but it’s better than popping Advil while its arms, legs, and neck get amputated by the market.