When Apple first introduced the iPhone to the world, there was a distinct lack of devices capable of competing with the new full-touchscreen design, apart from Palm.

Palm, at the time, was one of the favorites to compete with Apple, but Hewlett Packard acquired the company and decided to sit on the technology. Over the past few years, HP has started to sell parts of the brand, after declaring the phone brand dead. In 2013, LG announced WebOS, using Palm's second platform on TVs.

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Now, Alcatel One Touch owner TCL is looking to revive the Palm OS platform, and bring it to mobile devices. The Chinese company acquired the rights to Palm OS a few months ago in a move to potentially gain more ground in the U.S.

Alcatel One Touch is commonly known for budget handsets, and TCL is known for budget TVs. In the U.S., neither brand is well known among customers, who would rather buy from popular brands like Samsung, Apple, Motorola or Sony.

For anyone who can remember Palm OS though, it might be a turning point for Alcatel, especially if they can offer the same weird and wonderful designs Palm used to. Palm regularly updated software even when it wasn't launching phones, and TCL wants to make sure the same Palm OS design remains on the smartphone.

This could be a smart move, similar to Lenovo acquiring Motorola Mobility from Google for more presence in the U.S., but it is unclear how U.S. customers will react to a Palm OS smartphone in 2015.

TagsTCL, Alcatel One Touch, Palm OS, WebOS