14 DAY TRIAL // Mobile phone maker Palm is not having a very good time right now, and the recently unveiled financial previsions for the third quarter of its fiscal year 2010 showed exactly that. The company has taken a big hit from lower than expected sales of its webOS-based handsets, and analysts said that it would be affected by the newly announced Windows Phone 7 Series from Microsoft, something that determined Palm's CEO Jon Rubenstein to talk openly to employees and explain how things are at the moment. At the same time, he also highlighted some strategies the company will adopt for the short term so as to boost sales.
When it comes to the company's performance for the third quarter of its financial year 2010, the new forecast places revenues in the $300 to $320 million range. Moreover, the company also stated that its revenues for the entire fiscal year were expected to be lower than originally forecast, though it still sees a positive aspect for the Q3 results, namely the fact that it will end the time frame with $500 million in cash. The sales of Palm Pre and Palm Pixi, both standard and Plus models, are slower than expected, and this is the main reason for the lower revenues for Q3 FY2010, it seems, but Palm will work with its partners for increasing sales volumes.
“Dave Whalen and I just returned from a very successful meeting with Verizon Wireless, where they acknowledged that their execution of our launch was below expectations and recommitted to working with us to improve sales. To accelerate sales, we initiated Project JumpStart nearly three weeks ago. Since then, nearly two hundred Palm Brand Ambassadors, supplemented by Palm employees from Sunnyvale, have been training Verizon sales reps across the U.S. on our products. Early results from the stores have already shown improvement on product knowledge and sales week over week. You may have also seen a growing number of Palm ads on billboards, bus shelters, buses, and subway stations-all getting the word out about Palm,” CEO Jon Rubenstein states in a recent letter to employees, Engadget notes.
Palm's CEO also says the company is committed to accelerating adoption and growing distribution of their webOS platform, and that this will be the main focus for the following weeks. The company will announce its financial results for Q3 of fiscal year 2010 in March, though there won't be changes when compared to the preliminary results, it seems. For what it's worth, this is not the first time when Palm finds itself on the verge of collapse, as most of you might know, and it seems that Jon Rubenstein also believes in the company's ability to regenerate itself, “Our goals are taking longer than expected to achieve, but I am still confident that our talented team has what it takes to get the job done.”