Earlier this year, the hot news in technology was all about who or what was going to acquire Palm. At the end of the fiasco, HP was the one who walked away victorious with Palm's secret blueprints, acquiring the company for $1.2 billion in late April.
However, word on the street is that the competition for Palm was probably greater than we thought. Apple, Google and BlackBerry makers Research in Motion were also vying for the company's mobile technology.
Apple seemed to be interested in Palm's massive library of intellectual property and patents, and the Cupertino-based company might have also been interested in creating more competition for RIM in the keyboarded mobile devices category.
Google and RIM, on the other hand, both had very different reasons for wanting Palm added to their mobile family. RIM actually had a high bid before HP, but HP managed to blindside them with more cash in hand. And Google--well, what can we say about Google? They just wanted to bid on it because Apple was doing it.
If you ask us, sounds like a big fight on the playground over a tether pole. Since HP was the winner in this battle, it'll be interesting to see what they do with Palm's technology in the coming year.
