Once Upon a Time Apple Declined 'The First Smartphone'

[Michael Essany]

A fascinating tidbit about technology in 1990's was exposed this week in a new interview with Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs.

Speaking with Charlie Rose on PBS, Jacobs revealed that Apple once entertained the possibility of fusing Qualcomm's radio technology into the Newton PDA. But instead of really being ahead of its time at that time, Steve Jobs and company passed on the opportunity.

Jacobs, however, didn't relent. In fact, he took his bright idea over to the people at Palm, where the idea was met with a warmer reception. Specifically, Jacobs took his personal Newton over to Palm, "taped it to a Palm Pilot brochure (which was shaped just like one of the company’s PDAs), and began negotiations to put Palm’s operating system in a Qualcomm-powered smartphone."

That device ended being the Qualcomm PDQ, which has long been forgotten (it doesn’t even have its own Wikipedia entry) but remains an important milestone in the journey to the smartphone as we know it. The PDQ could be considered the first smartphone, since it combined a mobile (and app-focused) operating system with cellular connectivity.

So why the revelation now? It's all a matter of publicity and timing. Next week, the Qualcomm boss will deliver the keynote at the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada. All eyes are now on him.

Source: Venture Beat

[bigboyz]

So this is just a STUNT..ok ok cool. Im sure there are several opportunities passed by many companies daily. You never really know till you try..at least that is what I was taught.

[Mrteacup]

How would this even draw all eyes to him? I can't even remember his name. I doubt this was a stunt for attention but if it was it was horrible.