• GigaOm, Friday, January 9, 2009 11:31 AM

After several delays, Palm finally unveiled its new smartphone, the Palm Pre, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, along with WebOS, the mobile operating system on which the device will run. The new products left many wondering whether the once-mighty handset maker is poised to make a long overdue comeback.

Not so fast, says GigaOm's Om Malik. A pretty device, to be sure, Malik says the Pre offers features that are now typical of many smartphones. As industry analyst Michael Gartenberg points out, Pre's feature set is the minimum equivalent of what it takes to grab a seat at the smartphone table these days. However, "The (user interface) is smooth and works pretty seamlessly as they've showed," Gartenberg says. "Palm's always understood how to do a good mobile UI and it's clear that they've applied everything they've learned over the years to this device and platform. The Synergy technology is very impressive."

Malik wasn't quite so impressed. "So what? That doesn't guarantee success," he says. "I don't think Pre has done anything to move the needle forward...In a market where the iPhone sets the pace, Palm is woefully behind the curve." The Pre runs on the Sprint network and will be released sometime in the first half of the year--which may be too late to stop the momentum of rival products like RIM's BlackBerry or Apple's iPhone, Malik says.

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