By Ina Fried, 18 August 2003 08:22
NEWS In preparation for its split into two separate companies, Palm has come up with a name for its new, hardware-only unit: PalmOne. The company intends to call itself "Palm" until it finishes buying rival Handspring and spinning off its software unit this autumn. At that point, the new hardware-only company will adopt the PalmOne moniker, while the OS provider will keep its current PalmSource name. The move ends a complicated effort to divide the company while making sure each new part will reap the benefits of the well-known Palm name. The effort to name the two halves has been under way since the handheld provider started making plans to split two years ago. Ken Wirt, Palm's senior vice president of sales and marketing, said: "If one company just stayed the plain Palm, it wouldn't be fair to the other company." Neither the hardware maker nor the operating system company will get to make full use of the Palm name, which will be owned by a holding company jointly controlled by both entities. PalmSource, the software company, will own 55 per cent of the joint entity, though major decisions will be made by both partners, according to Palm. Wall Street will also notice a change, as the familiar "PALM" ticker symbol will be replaced by PalmSource's "PSRC" and PalmOne's "PLMO." Ina Fried writes for News.com
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