HP: WebOS phones only, no Win Phone 7
Hewlett-Packard will use newly acquired mobile software from Palm to power all forthcoming smartphones. But it will build a Windows 7-based tablet.
HP will offer WebOS phones only, and not Windows Phone 7.
(Credit: Palm)Hewlett-Packard confirmed Friday that it will not build phones with Microsoft's latest mobile software.
HP Senior Executive Todd Bradley told CNBC that the company will use WebOS, the mobile operating system acquired when it purchased Palm, on smartphones. HP will not be selling any Windows Phone 7-based devices, Bradley said.
It's not a huge surprise that HP wants to push its own software over Microsoft's after it spent $1.2 billion to get it. But, HP is Microsoft's biggest customer, and it's somewhat of a setback for Microsoft not to have the full backing of the largest tech company on the planet for the launch of its new mobile software later this year.
It's rumored that Microsoft does have other big names in smartphones signed up: Dell, Asus, LG, HTC, and Samsung. But it's clear that between Android and WebOS, Microsoft's offering for mobile isn't nearly as attractive to hardware makers as it once was.
HP still has plans to take advantage of its relationship with Microsoft in other ways. There's been a lot of confusion about whether HP still plans to ship the HP Slate with Windows 7 that it introduced at CES. But Bradley told CNBC Friday that HP will build a tablet PC with Windows 7 after all.
Previously, HP had said that it plans to build tablets with WebOS, which still appear to be coming in the future. Most recently, HP was granted a trademark on the term "PalmPad," which some have surmised to be the name of a future iPad-like device running the Palm software.
