Rubinstein had high hopes for an HP-owned Palm, saying at the time of the acquisition that he was confident webOS would "reach its full potential" with HP's backing. Perhaps it didn't turn out the way he expected.

AllThingsD is reporting that Rubinstein left the company on Friday with no immediate plays. His exit comes after the fulfillment of a commitment to stay with the technology giant for 12 to 24 months after the acquisition.

"Jon has fulfilled his commitment and we wish him well," HP spokeswoman Mylene Mangalindan said.

Rubinstein said, "I am going to take a well-deserved break after four-and-a-half years of developing webOS."

Rubinstein Unhappy?

HP bought Palm for $1.2 billion in April 2010. At the time, Todd Bradley, executive vice president of the Personal Systems Group at HP, said Palm's webOS operating system was the ideal platform to expand HP's mobility strategy and create a unique HP experience that spanned multiple connected devices.

Rubinstein came on board as senior vice president and general manager of the Palm global business unit at HP. He soon rolled out the Palm Pre 2 and webOS 2.0, which offered true multitasking. HP then got out of the mobile handset business and tried its webOS luck with the HP TouchPad, which was a dismal failure.

In July, HP shifted its webOS strategy. HP announced plans to accelerate the global expansion of webOS and moved Rubinstein off the project. HP appointed Stephen DeWitt as senior vice president and general manager of the webOS business unit and shifted Rubinstein over to a product innovation role within the company's Personal Systems Group.

But the ultimate deal breaker for Rubinstein may have been HP's move earlier this...
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Still, Samsung Electronics nearly kept pace with Apple by shipping 36.5 million smartphones during the same period, and on an annual basis led the 2011 field with 97.4 million unit shipments and a 20 percent global market share, said Strategy Analytics Executive Director Neil Mawston.

"With global smartphone shipments nearing half a billion units in 2011, Samsung is now well positioned alongside Apple in a two-horse race at the forefront of one of the world's largest and most valuable consumer electronics markets," Mawston said.

Apple shipped 93 million iPhones during 2011, and other industry analysts believe the coming iPhone 5 will help Apple maintain its explosive unit growth rates this year.

"Apple and Samsung continue to run neck and neck in global smartphone shipments, setting up a tight battle for leadership that will continue throughout 2012," said IHS iSuppli Senior Analyst Wayne Lam.

Nokia Loses Handset Share

In the global handset market overall, Samsung grew market share by more than one percentage point year-over-year to 21.3 percent, Strategy Analytics said. By contrast, Nokia's longtime leadership declined from 30.9 percent in the fourth quarter of 2010 to 25.5 percent in the final three months of last year.

"Volumes were buoyed by the sales of Nokia's low-end dual-SIM models in emerging markets like Southeast Asia, but were a little soft overall, as initial shipments of Lumia phones could not offset declining Symbian sales," Mawston said.

Though Nokia said fourth-quarter shipments of its new Lumia smartphones, based on Microsoft's Windows Phone platform, exceeded 1 million units, that milestone was dwarfed by the...
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