Piloting Palm

The Inside Story of Palm, Handspring and the Birth of the Billion-Dollar Hand-Held Industry

by Andrea Butter and David Pogue

John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2002

ISBN: 9780471089650
Pages: 368

Category: Industries

In this summary you will learn

• The story of Palm Computing Co. and it most famous product, the PalmPilot
• How a group of engineers led by Jeff Hawkins developed the PDA technology that revolutionized computing
• How Palm executives raised funds, plotted strategy and finally marketed their handheld products

Why you should read Piloting Palm

If you like your corporate biographies short on technological details and long on struggles for survival and success, Piloting Palm is the book for you. Andrea Butter, Palm’s marketing director in the early days, provides backstage access to Palm’s evolutionary drama, complete with political infighting, searches for cash and the simple quest for survival. The story is told largely from the point of view of Jeff Hawkins, whom Butter and co-author David Pogue dub the father of handheld computing. The involvement of such dynamic firms as Casio, Tandy, GeoWorks, America Online, Intuit and various venture capitalists makes the story all the more interesting. getAbstract.com recommends this book for its straightforward - although not all too objective - account of the creation of a modern technological phenomenon.

About the Authors

Andrea Butter  worked as Palm’s marketing director in the early days of Palm’s development, starting in 1993, when Palm just had 16 employees. Before then she had held various marketing positions with Apple and Claris. David Pogue has written and co-authored numerous computing manuals.

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