It has been a long time coming but finally the Palm Pre is coming to the UK. We reported back in July that the Palm Pre will be available exclusively on O2 in the UK. At the time of the announcement O2 said that the phone would be available in the UK “in time for the winter holidays.” Now O2 have decided on the launch date, October 16th.
For those who missed the Palm Pre launch in January of this year, the ‘Pre’ is a multimedia smartphone aimed squarely at the iPhone market. It has a 3.1-inch touch screen (320×480) display. The phone can slide open to reveal a QWERTY keyboard used to make messaging much easier. Similar to the iPhone, the touch screen is used with your fingers and not with a stylus.
The Pre will be free to customers signing up to a 2 year contract at £34.26 per month. It will also be free with an 18 month contract but with the higher monthly subscription of £44.05. For all other plans you will need to pay £96.89 when you start the subscription. For your £44.05 you get 1200 UK minute included and 500 messages. All of the Palm Pre plans include ‘unlimited’ data and WiFi hotspot access through The Cloud and BT Openzone.
Interesting the the Palm Pre plans are exactly the same as the iPhone. Admittedly this is for the older iPhone 3G 8GB and not the 16GB or 32GB iPhone 3GS, but still it is clear that O2 consider the Palm Pre, which has 8GB of storage, to be equivalent to the iPhone.
“There’s a lot of excitement about Palm Pre in Europe as we continue to expand Palm webOS products across new carriers and countries,” said Jon Rubinstein chairman and chief executive officer, Palm, Inc. “We look forward to launching Palm Pre with O2 so people in the UK can see firsthand how Palm webOS offers a new and better smartphone experience.”
It will be interesting to see how the Palm Pre competes head to head against the iPhone in the UK. Which is the better phone? It looks like the consumers will decide.
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Tags: iPhone, Mobiles, O2, October, Palm Pre, Phones, Tariffs, Tech, Technology
Although the specs for the Palm Pre are very similar to the iPhone, I don’t think it can compete with the iPhone’s sleek and stylish exterior. I think customers will still opt for the iPhone due to its supreme targeting in the smart mobile phone market.