For development of groundbreaking, commercially successful handheld computers and smartphones, which established the foundation for today’s mobile computing
Ed Colligan is a technology marketing executive who, with Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky, helped usher in the era of mobile computing. Colligan served as vice president of marketing at Radius Inc. before joining Palm Computing, where he masterminded the launch of the original PalmPilot. He positioned the device as a “connected organizer” rather than a standalone computer or a PDA (personal data assistant), which proved crucial to its mass adoption.
In 1998, Colligan cofounded Handspring with Hawkins and Dubinsky, eventually serving as president. There, he helped oversee the creation of the Treo, a groundbreaking smartphone that combined Palm’s interface with connectivity. Following the merger of Palm and Handspring, Colligan became CEO of Palm, Inc., in 2005, leading the company during its final major push with webOS and the Palm Pre.
After leaving Palm in 2009, Colligan shifted his focus to venture capital and climate tech. He served as a partner at Elevation Partners and, in 2022, was appointed head of Americas for Low Carbon, a renewable energy investment firm. As of 2025, he remains active in the tech community, serving on the board of the Thousand Brains Project, a nonprofit AI initiative founded by Jeff Hawkins.
