The top Linux/FOSS events of 2007 (ITWire) [LWN.net]

ITWire looks back at 2007. "OpenMoko hasn't received the same hype as, say, the Apple iPhone but it is truly remarkable in terms of the product itself as well as the philosophy of the company who freely give away all the keys to let anyone do anything with the phone. Perhaps in time a new release of the Neo may replicate the success of the ASUS Eee in the mobile world. I certainly think this is one product and company to keep an eye on."

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OpenMoko outcome far from clear

Posted Jan 2, 2008 14:07 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (subscriber, #2510) [Link]

I had really high hopes for OpenMoko. But in my opinion, there are a lot of signs that they might not make it. They got spun out of FIC, which was a company with the capital and distribution channel relationships to pull this off. The promised transition to production product is not in sight. Power management still isn't working in the prototype. The latest announcements are of the flavor of oh, we just realized that we've only implemented 3 bands even though we are using a 4 band chip, and it's going to add another prototype hardware revision that we'll have to test, until then no 850 MHz band in the US! The key software architect, Harald Welte, has left. The company claims to have built up to 50 people, way too big for this stage in the company's development, besides the management headache the venture funds burn rate would be high, and the time for profits still distant. The relationship to Google, and what Google will do to them, is unclear.

Maybe they'll pull it off, but now it's far from sure.

Bruce