HP today announced it has completed its acquisition of Palm Inc. at a price of $5.70 per share of Palm common stock in cash. The combination gives HP significant headway into one of technology’s fastest-growth segments with Palm’s webOS platform and family of smartphones, plus a rich portfolio of intellectual property from the smartphone pioneer.

HP’s global scale and financial strength plus Palm’s webOS experience, as well as its acclaimed Pre and Pixi smartphone product lines, enhance HP’s ability to participate more aggressively in the highly profitable, $100 billion smartphone and connected mobile device markets.

"With webOS, HP will deliver its customers a unique and compelling experience across smartphones and other mobility products," said Todd Bradley, executive vice president, Personal Systems Group, HP. "This allows us the opportunity to fully engage in growing our smartphone family offering and the footprint of webOS."

Under Jon Rubinstein, former Palm chairman and chief executive officer, the Palm global business unit will report to Bradley. Palm will be responsible for webOS software development and webOS based hardware products, from a robust smartphone roadmap to future slate PCs and netbooks.