HP CTO Phil McKinney Makes Laptop Mag’s “Top 25 Most Influential People in Mobile Tech”

Last month, Laptop Magazine put out an interesting piece called the Top 25 Most Influential People in Mobile Tech 2010. We all seemed to totally miss this one. Thanks to AboutwebOS, we found out that someone we all know and love was on this list.

Coming in at #18 was our favorite VP and CTO of HP Personal Systems Group, Phil McKinney. Laptop Magazine had some nice stuff to say about him.

We’re not sure what the final product is going to look like, but now that HP has acquired Palm (and its webOS operating system) HP’s Slate has the potential to be much more interesting. What will it finally look like? Ask McKinney, the ultimate arbiter of the Slate project. McKinney has openly wondered on his personal blog when would be the best time to release such a device. But if the world’s leading PC maker gets it right, the Slate could challenge Apple’s iPad, which sold more than 1 million units in its first month. In May rumors starting circulating that HP’s webOS-powered Slate would launch as soon as late summer or early fall. The code name for this product? Hurricane, which is fitting since McKinney’s baby could very well blindside the Android competition.

Congratulations Phil! Well-deserved. Hopefully the next time we see this Most Influential person, he won’t be holding a flexible display prototype, or a blacked-out prototype, but a brand-new webOS phone running webOS 2.0. (Hey, we can dream can’t we?)

[Source: Laptop Magazine via AboutwebOS]