More company names have been thrown into the ring as possible contenders to take the webOS mobile operating system off HP’s hands. BlackBerry-maker RIM, IBM, Oracle and Intel have all been named by Reuters sources as being interested in the OS which HP bought in 2010 as part of its US$1.2 billion acquisition of Palm.

Amazon, which has previously been rumoured to be interested in webOS, was also named by the sources, who added that the deal is unlikely to fetch as much as HP paid for Palm as the platform has received little investment since being acquired. Other companies to have been linked to webOS include phone makers HTC, LG and Samsung and chipset maker Qualcomm. Samsung distanced itself from any deal while Qualcomm was non-committal about any interest it might have.

As recently as March this year, former HP CEO HP Leo Apotheker said webOS would be incorporated into most of its products with the short-lived TouchPad tablet as the flagship model. HP then announced in August that it would stop offering devices powered by webOS, and was “exploring strategic alternatives” for the device software platform with investment bank Parella Weinberg appointed to advise HP about its options.

The company then announced it planned to shut down its mobile devices business during the fiscal fourth quarter of 2011 despite a final production run for the webOS-powered TouchPads, following a surge in sales prompted by a significant price cut for the device.
It was reported in September that HP was starting the process of cutting jobs in the division that oversees the development of webOS. In a statement, the company said the former Palm device business had “not met internal milestones and financial targets.”

However, new HP CEO Meg Whitman – appointed in September – recently said in an interview with Reuters that the company hasn’t ruled out building a new tablet based on webOS. "The question now before us is what do we do with webOS software and do we come back to market with webOS devices," she said.

Parella Weinberg has since been replaced by Bank of America Merrill Lynch as adviser to HP, according to sources. "We are exploring ways to optimise the webOS software," an HP spokesman told Reuters regarding the current situation.