After HP purchased Palm, gutted it, and sold its remains to LG, Palm's former CEO Jon Rubinstein has kept a relatively low profile. Rubinstein may not yet be ready to make a big splash, but he is set to join Qualcomm's board of directors, reports All Things D. Rubinstein already serves on Amazon's board, and on Qualcomm he would be adding his years of experience building products to Qualcomm's expertise in creating the chips that power them. Qualcomm quickly confirmed the report in a press release, wherein Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs said that "His experience in creating revolutionary consumer electronics and mobile products will provide added insight to Qualcomm's board."

Beyond helping create the original iPod, Rubinstein is best known for helming Palm as it tried to reinvent itself with webOS and the Pre series of phones. The company essentially ran out of runway and was purchased by HP, who failed utterly to put sufficient resources behind webOS and then killed its chances as then-CEO Leo Apotheker tried to reinvent HP as a services company. Rubinstein stepped back to a generic "product innovation" role at HP in July of 2011 only to leave enitrely in January 2012.

Joining Qualcomm makes sense for both Rubinstein and the company. When The Verge spoke to Rubinstein in January of 2012, he said that after a "break" he would continue in that space: "I think the future is mobile."