Garmin & Asus Release Official Statement, No New Products Coming

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There has been plenty of chatter lately about the demise of the Garmin-Asus partnership. Bottom line, it looks like those rumors have been true and according to the official statement — no new products will be released.

“Garmin Ltd. and ASUSTeK Computer Inc. today announced a strategic decision to alter their current co-branded business model for location-centric mobile handsets.”

Basically what is happening is that the two companies will no longer introduce any new “co-branded handset models,” however they do plan to continue selling and supporting the models that have already been released. Of course, with some of the rumors involving the sales of the Garminfone, the use of the word “sell” may be more a formality. The other item that remains a mystery is how long they will actually continue to try and sell these models. After all, smartphones have a rather short life cycle these days and I would not be surprised to see these leave the market sooner rather than later.

All said and done, this partnership saw the introduction of six models and began in February 2009.

Moving forward it was noted that Asus will “design and manufacture new models of ASUS-branded mobile phones.” Though, it was further stated that some of those models will include “preloaded Garmin navigation and Location Based Service (LBS) applications.” So while we may not see another Garmin-Asus branded phone, we may see an Asus phone with Garmin navigation. As for Garmin, they were noted as looking to expand their “mobile handset application development and plans to offer navigation and other applications through certain consumer application stores.”

Lastly, both companies have third quarter earnings reports coming up, at which time we can expect to here more about how they plan to proceed in the future. The Asus earnings report is set for October 28th and Garmin will follow a few days later on November 3rd.