Handheld Prices Continue to Plummet

Handspring announced Monday that it would sell its Treo 180 and 180g Communicator devices for a retail price of $99, after a $150 rebate.

The 180s are both GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) voice and data monochrome devices that use the Palm operating system and T-Mobile for cellular service. The major difference between the two is the Treo 180's built-in keyboard; the 180g uses Graffiti without a keyboard.

Handspring's announcement follows by less than 30 days introductions of lower-price handhelds from Hewlett-Packard, with its Model 1910 at $299, and Dell Computer, with its Axim 5 for $199.

Price Point

The $99 price point is indicative of a number of trends, the first of which may be that consumer and enterprise buyers want color devices. "Sales of the Treo 270 color device far outstripped monochrome sales," said David Hayden, president of MobileWeek, in Palo Alto, California.

Hayden also said that salespeople were not properly educated on how to sell the product, noting that salespeople in the carriers' retail outlets need to be trained on selling feature-rich data devices. "The $99 price will help clear out Handspring's and the carriers' inventory," Hayden said.

Sagging Sales

The most recent sell-through numbers from IDC in Framingham, Massachusetts, indicate a 6 percent drop in sales of handhelds of all types in the third quarter of 2002 compared to the third quarter of 2001. "Over the holiday season the sub-$200 price point will drive volume sales," Hayden said.

In related handheld news, Adobe Systems this week will ship its Acrobat Reader Version 5 for cell phones running the Symbian operating system. Version 5 for Symbian will allow users to open PDF files on data phones. The new version is a free download at Adobe's Web site. Its initial offering will be for Nokia 9290 and 9210 handsets.