Verizon Will Get the Palm Pre in January

With the Palm Pre's successful launch over the weekend on Sprint, many are now asking when this model will be offered by other phone companies. The answer is in for Verizon Wireless: the beginning of next year.

While many customers of rival carriers might hope for an earlier release, Sprint has an agreement with Palm that gives it exclusive access to this device for the remainder of 2009.

Verizon apparently isn't going to wait very long after that. Citing "a person familiar with the situation," the Wall Street Journal is reporting that this company will release its version of the Pre in January.

This is in line with a recent statement by Verizon's CEO. Lowell McAdam said his company would have the Pre in "the next six months or so".

An Overview of the Palm Pre and the webOS
The Palm Pre uses Palm's webOS, the replacement for the venerable Palm OS. This is a new, multi-tasking operating system able to wirelessly synchronize a wide variety of data with online services like Google and Facebook, as well as Microsoft Exchange.

The Pre itself features a sliding keyboard as well as a multi-touch-capable 3.1-inch display. This device is also equipped with 8 GB of on-board Storage (7 GB available to users), Wi-Fi b/g, Bluetooth 2.1, GPS, and a 3.0 megapixel camera with LED flash. 

As mentioned earlier, this smartphone will be available first from Sprint, who has added its mobile broadband service EV-DO Rev. A, Sprint Navigation, and Sprint TV. 

A Canadian version from Bell Mobility will be released later this year, while the GSM version for Europe and Latin America is also expected before 2010, and will have the 3G standard HSDPA.

Source: Wall Street Journal