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To: Elwood P. Dowd who wrote (92159)	7/12/2001 8:40:52 PM
From: Elwood P. Dowd	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 97611

July 12, 2001 Psion Plans Withdrawal From Hand-Held Market By David Pringle Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal LONDON -- Psion PLC, Europe's largest maker of hand-held computers, said it will withdraw from the increasingly competitive consumer market. The company said it won't launch any new hand-held computers for consumers, abandoning plans to release an organizer with a Bluetooth connection -- a short-range radio technology for transferring data wirelessly -- in the second half. David Levin, chief executive of Psion, said that hand-held computers are fast becoming a commodity with low margins and that Bluetooth is taking off much slower than expected. "It is not clear that Bluetooth is going to evolve in the way people have been talking about," he said in an interview. Psion's withdrawal underlines both how competitive the personal-organizer market is becoming, as companies such as Sony Corp. enter the fray, and how Bluetooth is still a long way from fulfilling its mission to become a ubiquitous technology that allows all sorts of electronic devices to exchange data. Psion will continue to supply Bluetooth modules to other companies, but Mr. Levin said the standard isn't proving as popular as the company's products based on standards for wireless local-area networks, or LAN. Although wireless LAN radio chips are typically more expensive than Bluetooth chips, the technology is more mature and can transfer data at higher speeds. Psion's customers are saying, "we will do Bluetooth second, and we're not sure when," Mr. Levin said. For Psion, the decision to withdraw from the consumer hand-held computer market is a painful one. The company is widely associated with its distinctive clamshell personal organizers, which are equipped with a miniature keyboard that sets them apart from the tablet-style organizers sold by U.S.-based Palm Inc. and most other manufacturers. Although the European market is still growing rapidly, Psion's products are facing mounting competition from mobile phones with built-in organizers, as well as Palm, Compaq Computer Corp. and other computer companies. "It is sad in a way, because Psion is a European company and it is a company that was really leading the hand-held market just a couple of years ago," said Chris Jones, an analyst with U.K.-based market research firm canalys.com