Sell Big or Die Fast

Seven weeks after it was put on sale, Hewlett-Packard killed its TouchPad tablet, the company’s competitor to Apple’s iPad.

Hewlett-Packard killed the TouchPad after 48 days, cut the price and created a buying frenzy.

Last year, Microsoft pulled the plug on its Kin mobile phones only 48 days after they went on sale.
In recent years, technology companies have been cutting their losses with increasing speed. Google proudly released Wave, its platform of collaborative work tools, to the general public in May 2010. It canceled Wave 77 days later. Palm announced its first tablet, the Foleo, on May 30, 2007. By Sept. 4, the company halted development and the product was never sold.

New York Times:


http://www.nytimes.com/pages/technology/index.html