One of the remnants of HP"s ill-fated acquisition of Palm has now left the company. AlllThingsD.com reports that Jon Rubinstein, who was the former head of Palm and later came on board HP when the company bought Palm, has now officially made his departure from HP. A company spokesperson said, "Jon has fulfilled his commitment and we wish him well."
Rubinstein first gained fame at Apple where he helped to develop the company"s iPod. He took over as Palm"s CEO in 2009 and led the company to develop its WebOS operating system. In April 2010, Palm was acquired by HP for $1.2 billion and Rubinstein signed on to remain at HP.
The company tried to integrate Palm"s WebOS into its products, particularly its HP TouchPad tablet. However, the product bombed out of the gate when it launched in July 2011 and in August HP pulled the plug on all future WebOS devices, including the TouchPad. In December, HP announced plans to make WebOS an open source product and also revealed it would make new WebOS-based hardware products once again.
Rubinstein"s departure from HP was expected for some time following the sales failure of the TouchPad tablet. It is currently unknown what Rubinstein will be doing for his next gig.