I wasn’t aware of them. What was the business model problem from your point of view?
Both the speed and weight were a deal breaker, from what I saw in the video. In the 90’s, if it took that long for text input on that thick heavy thing, I’m bringing my PowerBook instead.
Go read Jerry Kaplan's book "startup" about the issues or "The barbarians led by bill gates"
Price, supply, competition, software availability - all the classic problems that plagues all the "might have beens"; from the Atari Jaguar, the BeBox, Amiga, etc.
There's plenty of brilliant ideas that are in penpoint that have been abandoned.
The stars aligned for Apple but they could have easily aligned for GRiD or Visi On or Digital Research as well. Heck, the Japanese MSX system could have achieved in the mid 1980s what the USCD p-system also failed at and we technically didn't get until the Java phones of the early 2000s of true cross system compatibility.
So much of this is merely the whims and fancy of lady luck
Both the speed and weight were a deal breaker, from what I saw in the video. In the 90’s, if it took that long for text input on that thick heavy thing, I’m bringing my PowerBook instead.