RIP TouchPad, Pre: HP Confirms WebOS Division Lay-offs
This shouldn't come as a surprise.
HP's webOS division is having a tough time as of late. The company recently announced that it was axing its TouchPad and Pre line of tablets and smartphones and sold off all remaining stock in a huge fire sale. Since then, the future of webOS remains unclear. While HP said it would continue to develop webOS, it admitted that it was stopping development on webOS hardware. Today, HP confirmed that it's trimming the fat in the webOS division.
"As communicated on August 18, HP will discontinue the development of webOS devices within the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2011, which ends Oct. 31, 2011," the company told AllThingsD today. "As part of this decision, the webOS GBU is undergoing a reduction in workforce. Today’s actions are part of this initiative. During this time, we stand by our commitment to our webOS customers and will work to ensure that support and service for customers are not adversely affected. HP is exploring ways to leverage webOS software."
HP has not specified how many people will lose their jobs but the number is rumored to be somewhere in the region of 500 people. AllThingsDigital cites sources close to the situation that say HP is preparing to lay off 525 people. HP has one final production run on TouchPads before it discontinues the development of webOS devices and winds down device operations within its fourth fiscal quarter.

the end of their own os on a tablet, yes, end of tablet altogether, not yet.
Fiscal years for business' very commonly don't start and stop at the beggining/end of the year.
They still make tablets, just go to newegg and see for yourself the slate are still listed though quite expensive, they simply cut off WebOS ... sad for me as I loved WebOS and still use my pre, and I couldn't ge tone of the hp touchpads at the firesale price (hoping to in the email group though)
Absolutely Leo "the loser" lion Apotheker is a PRIME example of how it is OBVIOUS that these elites DO NOT get their job because they have the qualifications or ability, but through connections.
I kind of hope so. I have no faith in HP, not their desktops, NOT their servers, not their support and not their ability to innovate or do business.
HP..... die.
They write off the loss in their taxes.
I hope so too let the company tht trully care about their products and their company stay alive, the other one is toshiba, their tablet is so shitty with their ugly ass screen and their 1980s laptop design. When are these naty companies gonna wake up tht there are so many competition out there and if they want to survive, they need to listen and learn...fast from the market and their consumers and not cutting corners
We really didn't have much in a way of laptops in the 80s... only near the very end did we see things like the Mac Portable, which was about 17 lbs, very limited battery power. Or maybe a GRID with a very narrow screen...
I own an iPad... I like it, I don't use it everyday. But when I want to look something up and I don't want to wait about 30~45 seconds for my quad core Windows7 computer to boot up... I can power up the iPad and be on the internet in a second or two.
THAT is why people like tablets.
The 16:9 screens are fine for wide-screen movies, for anything else - they suck. That a major reason I will most likely go with an iPad3 before going with a ThinkPad tablet.