Palm Unveils 'Pre' Smartphone

Palm unveiled a new smartphone today, the Pre, which it hopes will compete with the iPhone and restore the company’s place in the market, the New York Times reports. Industry experts say it won't be easy. The Pre has a touchscreen, 8 gigs of storage, and a new operating system designed for fast websurfing. Palm says it will “redefine the center of your access point to the Internet.”

The Pre will be available “as soon as possible,” at an undisclosed price and exclusively from Sprint. Palm touted the operating system, saying it "gives us the opportunity to innovate the way Google does. This product is just the starting point.” But a new luxury device is always a tough sell in a souring economy. “Palm finds itself in a very difficult situation,” one analyst said. “They’re flying into a headwind here.” (More Palm stories.)