A Tale of Two Palms: One CEO Inbound & One Outbound

Following Todd Bradley’s resignation at palmOne a few months ago and after acting as interim CEO, Ed Colligan (right) last week was officially appointed the company’s new CEO.

Ed was not only one of the earliest recruits at Palm when it was originally founded but also later became a co-founder of Handspring – the company which invented our beloved Treo.  His smartphone and PDA lineage is thus among the purest that you will find and the hope (mine included) is very much that he will be able to re-energize palmOne with the founding passion and spirit that existed before the company merged/was taken over by various corporations in a maddening downward spiral of lifeless products and innovation.

Meanwhile in a seemingly unrelated event, David Nagel (above left), PalmSource’s CEO abruptly resigned yesterday just hours ahead of the launch of his company’s Mobile Summit & DevCon which I have specifically come to attend in San Jose – talk about starting a conference with a bang...

Since I don’t really believe in coincidences (nor am I by extension a conspiracy theorist) it would appear that the two Palm chiefs might have had reasons to disagree which will have prompted Nagel to exit the scene.  Considering that palmOne is still PalmSource’s single largest licensee it would seem obvious that any displeasure at the first company will have significant repercussions on the second.

Clearly, as in Ed Colligan’s case, a new CEO will typically be expected to do some ‘spring cleaning’ and a couple of new internal promotions immediately following his appointement would seem to have been a message that change (undoubtedly required) is very much on his agenda.  David Nagel’s departure would thus appear to reinforce these new changes in a most visible manner at the very top of the organisation and I expect to see more news of this type in the months to follow.  At the same time, I have no doubt that PalmSource’s conference will be filled with many rumours of more things to come…

On a personal level, I have enjoyed spending time with Ed and David in the past and wish both much success in their now separate endeavours.

UPDATE: After listening to David and Ed’s keynote speeches at the PalmSource conference it became fairly obvious that there is actually a very good entente – even friendship – between both and I apologize for having previously suggested that all may not have been well on this front.

PalmSource CEO David Nagel Steps Down [Forbes]
PalmSource Announces Leadership Transition [PalmSource Press Release]
PalmOne Board Names Ed Colligan CEO [palmOne Press Release]
PalmOne Names John Hartnett & Mark Bercow as Senior Vice Presidents [palmOne Press Release]

Treonauts have more important things to think about than company politics…