PalmSource makes play for China

A month after hinting at new licensees, PalmSource has revealed the partners it will work with to exploit the Chinese market for handheld computers.

As expected, the Palm OS company - still, for now, a subsidiary of Palm Inc - has signed a licensing agreement with Legend, China's largest computer manufacturer.

It has also inked agreements with Group Sense (International) Limited (GSL) as well as PiTech (a system development partner), Tsinghua-Solutions (for developer training in Beijing) and Zhong Shan University (for developer training in Guangzhou).

PalmSource will make available a simplified Chinese version of the Palm OS and localised versions of Palm OS 4.2 and Palm OS 5.3. These will be made available in the second and third quarters of next year and for Motorola 68K and Intel, Motorola and Texas Instruments microprocessors respectively.

The company has opened a subsidiary office in Hong Kong and a representative office in Beijing.

PalmSource's first China Developer Forum will be held 11-12 December in Beijing and will also feature existing Palm licensees Acer, Handspring, Samsung, Sony and Symbol.

Around 25 million Palm-based handhelds have been sold since the PalmPilot made its debut and the OS arm reckons the current Chinese market could already be worth around four to seven million units per year.

"It's a little hard to tell today exactly how big it is but at the upper end [of that estimate] it is like the US," PalmSource CEO David Nagel recently told journalists.