Skip to main content

HP wants to take webOS everywhere: appliances, cars, you name it

The TouchPad is rumored to be bombing at retail, but that isn’t slowing down HP’s plans for webOS. Much like Google’s Android ambitions, HP is hoping to embed webOS in smart appliances, gadgets, cars, and just about anything else that has a screen. HP’s new head of webOS, Stephen DeWitt spoke with the WSJ (via CNET) about the potential of the company’s smartphone platform, noting that there is an “enormous amount of interest” in webOS as a platform. 

This stance mirror’s Google’s approach to Android. At its Google I/O conference this year, Google revealed that it is working to integrate Android into smart appliances and a variety of other electronics. HP has been hinting at an expanded future for webOS since it revealed the TouchPad earlier this year. The computer maker plans to integrate webOS into all of its computers by 2012 and is actively looking at licensing partnerships

Recommended Videos

“I happen to believe that WebOS is a uniquely outstanding operating system,” said HP CEO Leo Apotheker during the D9 conference. “It’s not correct to believe that it should only be on HP devices. There are all kinds of other people who want to make whatever kind of hardware they make and would like to connect them to the Internet.”

We are fans of webOS, but if HP hopes to expand the platform, it will have to deal with the performance issues we’ve seen on the TouchPad and Palm Pre devices and work to drum up more interest from the developer community. Currently, webOS is a distant fifth place competitor in the smartphone race, ranking behind Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform. 

Jeffrey Van Camp
Former Digital Trends Contributor
As DT's Deputy Editor, Jeff helps oversee editorial operations at Digital Trends. Previously, he ran the site's…
Honda unveils sleek electric sedan and SUV prototypes at CES 2025
Honda 0 Saloon and Honda 0 SUV prototypes.

Honda’s next-generation electric vehicles are a step closer to production. At CES 2025, the automaker unveiled prototypes of the 0 Saloon and 0 SUV, the first two of its 0 Series EVs that will start rolling off assembly lines in Ohio next year.

The two EVs follow 0 Series concept cars Honda unveiled at CES 2024. These are closer to what buyers can expect to see in showrooms, hence the label of “prototype” rather than “concept.” How close exactly? When Honda unveils a prototype, that vehicle generally makes the transition to production with minimal changes. But that would be particularly remarkable here.
They still look like concept cars

Read more
Digital Trends’ Top Tech of CES 2025 Awards
Top Tech of CES

Las Vegas is overrun. Every billboard in town is shouting about AI, hotel bar tops now sport a sea of laptops, and after hours The Strip is elbow to elbow with engineers toting yard-long beers.

That means CES, the year’s biggest tech bacchanalia, has come to town, and Digital Trends editors have spent the last four days frolicking among next year’s crop of incredible TVs, computers, tablets, and EVs. We’re in heaven.

Read more
Sony and Honda’s Afeela 1 EV makes more sense at CES than in the real world
Afeela 1 front quarter view.

The Sony car is almost here. After its creation via a joint venture with Honda in 2022 and two years’ worth of prototypes, the electronics giant’s Afeela brand is finally taking reservations for its first electric vehicle, with deliveries scheduled to start in 2026.

But will it be worth the wait? Coinciding with the opening of reservations, Sony Honda Mobility brought updated prototypes of the Afeela 1 (as it’s now officially known) to CES 2025, representing what California customers (Afeela is only taking reservations in that state) who put down a $200 refundable deposit can expect when they take delivery.

Read more