After unsuccessfully trying to sell or license webOS, HP decided late last year to open-source WebOS. HP has even started the process of open-sourcing by introducing tools among developers for App development on the platform. Meg Whitman, HP’s CEO, explained HP’s position while speaking with CRN.
“There is a clear vision of what we’re trying to accomplish,” Whitman said. “There will be some people who will not love that vision, and then there are people who are very excited about this vision, and what it can mean for an alternative, open-source operating system that has some real strengths to it.
“We’re going to build another operating system that has huge advantages, in my view, over iOS, which is a closed system, Android, which is incredibly fragmented and may ultimately be more closed with acquisition of Motorola Mobility”, said Meg Whitman in the interview.
Hp failed miserably with its TouchPad tablet but isn’t giving up yet. It’ll not be WebOS running on their return to the tablet market. “We have to have a tablet offering,” Whitman said. “We will be back in that business. We’re coming back into the market with a Windows 8 tablet, first on an x86 chip and then maybe on an ARM chip.”
WebOS will still play a role at HP it seems, though it remains unclear what exactly that role will be and if we’ll ever come to see a impressive WebOS device.
