Once dominant in the PDA market, Palm is facing stiff competition from rival mobile vendors, such as Research In Motion (RIM) and Motorola.

Palm has been losing market share to rival converged handheld technologies that offer extra functions such as email, business data, applications and voice calling.

Computing met Palm president and chief executive Ed Colligan in Dublin last month, at the launch of the company’s first European research and development engineering centre, to discuss the company’s plans to increase market penetration with Treo, a next-generation smartphone range.

What defines a next-generation smartphone?

The next-generation smartphone is not all that different to new applications. Few companies have deployed smartphones as tools because they tend to be expensive.

Smartphones enable mobile email, which is only starting to be adopted at an enterprise level and usually by executives.

When I look at these kinds of tools –

and the products facilitating them – smartphones have the opportunity to make a bigger impact in the enterprise space.

It is great that you can get any information you want off the company network, be more timely in scheduling meetings and be exposed to a more broad amount of knowledge when mobile.

But mobility is a well-established strategy for increasing productivity. What extra capabilities will next-generation smartphones offer?

As companies continue to look at how they can be more productive, executives have realised they cannot physically be in the office any more than they already are.

A smartphone can empower them to

do more of their work, whenever and wherever they are.

I think of a next-generation smartphone as a PC. When most people think of PCs, they think of that box on their desktop that has access to every application they need.

I use my smartphone to access applications personalised to me. I even use my smartphone in my personal life.

I believe the lines between personal computing and business IT are becoming more and more blurred.

Customers want PC features when they are on the move, travelling, or just away from their desk – and smartphones make that more possible.

Are you saying the trend towards smartphone adoption is driving equal demand among business and consumers for converged devices?

The idea that one size can fit everyone will not work, and to have a debate over this is a waste of time.

Kids may want music devices; some want it all in one package. People have the choice now because bigger memory cards are available.

Two years ago the must-have device was the iPod if you wanted your music on the move.

Now you don’t need a standalone device to achieve that. To me, it is all about empowering people who are on the go.

I actually get email faster with my smartphone now. If you were to send me an email, it would show up on my Treo faster than it would on my desktop PC.

The key to smartphone adoption is its integration into the prevailing IT environment.

What will attract chief information officers (CIOs) to Palm’s next-generation technology?

IT professionals, for good reason, are sceptical people. They have to be careful about new technologies and must find legitimate uses for them.

But major firms are using smartphones in big numbers: and mostly for email.

There is no reason why financial services people, doctors or salespeople cannot get information on a smartphone.

Smartphones are great blogging tools and the techies know this. But they can also be used for business applications, such as sales force automation.

You can have the necessary forms and tools to use a smartphone on the move and link into the central database with updated, real-time information.

These devices can be an incredibly powerful tool from a sales force automation standpoint.

If you put me with a CIO and told me his or her top five most used applications, I am sure we could figure out how to use a smartphone with them.

What would you say to those in the IT industry who claim smartphone functionality and security is not sufficiently developed?

I do not agree with that. The mobility market has changed drastically. There are more than 7,000 companies worldwide who have deployed our Treo.

I would not call that a small level of adoption. But if you were to ask if these smartphones were being used to access every business application except email,

I would have to say no.

A few years ago Palm was, essentially, talking about handheld computers – PDAs. The big, fundamental change is high-speed wireless development.

Devices now have data transfer in both directions, as well as Wan (wide area network) functionality.

The advent of built-in keyboards also makes a difference. Just those few subtle changes have made a huge difference in useability.

I would say to anyone who rejected PDAs three years ago to take another look at the smartphone market.

RIM’s BlackBerry seems to have cornered the market on mobile email. What do your products offer in response?

Most companies that have deployed RIM devices are blue-chip businesses with a distributed office network, requiring the deployment of the same device for use across the world.

RIM had network efficiencies that were relative to the deployment of the BlackBerry device in Europe.

It started with email earlier than we did and has gained traction faster. But there are lots of things, that if you look beyond email, RIM devices do not do at all.

We are saying that Palm has the best of both worlds. First, you get the best user experience from the Palm operating system. On top of that there is the best of Microsoft’s very broad-based platform.

Palm facts

1996: Palm Computing is founded as a US mobile computing vendor, launching the Pilot brand of products

1997: 3Com buys Palm Computing as part of its purchase of internet telephony company US Robotics. Months later the company licenses its Palm operating system (OS) platform for the first time

1998: Mobile computing rival Handspring licenses the Palm OS platform

1999: Palm achieves nearly 73 per cent of the US mobile market and 68 per cent

worldwide, according to IDC research

2002: Palm splits into two distinct companies: PalmOne is given responsibility for selling its smartphone devices, and the Palm OS subsidiary sells its platform for use with PDAs

2003: Palm acquires rival Handspring

2004: Former Handspring chief executive Ed Colligan is promoted from Wireless Business Unit senior vice president and general manager to chief executive and president of Palm

2005: Palm’s total worldwide share of the smart mobile device market falls 0.2 per cent year-on-year in the current third quarter, according to Canalys Research