HP

[WickerBill]

It must be a really bad business if you're bailing out of the segment where you hold the most market share in the world.
HP bails out of the PC market (http://www.infoworld.com/d/computer-hardware/hp-bails-and-dell-fades-who-will-make-pcs-170336)

Either that or their CEO is a fool.

[mapguy]

I was stunned when I heard that on my way to work this morning. Getting into software? Really? You look at the weekly flyers from Best Buy and Futureshop and 70-80% of the PC's and laptops are HP.

Put me down for thinking the CEO is a fool.

[KLang]

I've worked with several of HP's enterprise software packages. Their support area needs a lot of work. :yuck: Hardware support was usually good.

[racer2c]

WP article - 'HP To Apple: You Win.'

:eek:

[NismoZ]

Cool...I just bought one of their slimline towers.:shakehead I had a great uncle who invested in a Havana casino in the mid '50s too.

[Andrew Longman]

Figure this.

The PC has become a commodity piece of plastic, silicon and green board. Innovation is largely happening in phones and software. It is increasingly difficult to create a competitive advantage other than price (and by definition only one company can be the lowest cost).

So it is a race to the bottom. That's a losing strategy. Let Acer have it.

I already know many people who ONLY have an Ipad, store data on a cloud and hook it to keyboards and monitors as they need/feel like it. That's they future -- at least many think so.

Bold move, but probably less desperate than trying to stay in the PC business 5 years from now.

[Ankf00]

PC's are a minimal margin commoditized operation and a shrinking segment. Flex or Foxconn or whomever else are the ones making them anyway, not HP. Might as well get out while there's still value in that business to sell, question is if someone in asia buys it outright instead of split+IPO.

IBM/Oracle and now HP/Dell make their cash money from software+services+enterprise hardware, that's why they're buying up 3Par, Compellent, Ocarina, etc. looking at Brocade, Autonomy etc.

The shocker to me is the decision to shut down WebOS and related product development, they seemingly bought Palm yesterday, and even though Mark Hurd is gone they were still going forth with their new enterprise+products strategy. That bit was a shocker to even their own marketing & product mgrs.

final note:

F@#$ YOU
http://money.cnn.com/2005/02/09/technology/hp_fiorina/carly_fiorina_hp.03.jpg


She took a legendary corporation whose founders' offices at Stanford are still on display for all, and went and ran it into the ground, ruining another great American company that invented the first PC clone in the process. Now her trainwreck's coming full circle by spinning off Compaq in the end. She should've won that Senate campaign, she belongs in that gallery of Rhodes scholars.

[Andrew Longman]

She took a legendary corporation whose founders' offices at Stanford are still on display for all, and went and ran it into the ground, ruining another great American company that invented the first PC clone in the process. The old culture of HP -- the HP Way, was also a joy to work with. Fact-based decision making. A complete commitment to doing the right things the right way. Never putting a single product example in the market they didn't believe was made completely correct. Respecting proven and established and effective ways of working. etc.

Carly? Not so much.

[WickerBill]

that's why they're buying up 3Par, Compellent, Ocarina, etc. looking at Brocade, Autonomy

I was really bummed when they bought 3par. Good stuff that.

[Ankf00]

I was really bummed when they bought 3par. Good stuff that.

I don't get that one any more than I get palm, I applauded them squeezing Dell for value b/c htey could, don't understand them actually going throuhg with the purchase and paying that much for 3par when they could've turned around and bought Brocade or anyone else in the valley for 1/8th the cost with the same strategic value.

[Ankf00]

Carly? An opportunistic, philandering whore.

indeed. [/full mysognistic]

[Ankf00]

http://www.cringely.com/2011/08/losing-the-hp-way/

http://www.cringely.com/wp-content/uploads/bill_dave-300x175.jpg


Hewlett Packard was different from other Silicon Valley companies and always a leader. By the time I met Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard in the late 1970s they were nearing retirement but still active and I knew them, working occasionally for both men and for their respective foundations. Hewlett was the good cop and Packard was the bad cop, but both men had figured out through a steady process of evolution over four decades how to build and run a fantastic company. Those days are over. Though confirmed by this week’s HP decisions to change direction and ditch the PC business, let’s understand something: the HP I knew died many years ago.

...

The decline of HP began, I think, with the spinoff of Agilent Technologies in 1999. Lew Platt was running HP and he thought the company was too diversified and really needed to concentrate on computers, storage, and imaging. So everything else was spun-off into Agilent. And while this made sense at the time and even today, there were unintended consequences of that spinoff — the loss of HP’s corporate soul. You see Hewlett Packard was in 1999 an instrument company that made a hell of a lot of money from printers, not a printer company that also built instruments. Hewlett and Packard were instrument guys: had they still been on the job in 1999 they would have gone with Agilent. If Packard was still alive in 1999 I doubt that the spinoff would even have happened.

Lew Platt blew it in my view. And then of course he left the company in the hands of… Carly Fiorina?

I knew Lew Platt, too. When Platt left HP he ran the Kendall-Jackson wine business for a couple years and Jess Jackson, Lew’s new boss, was my neighbor at the time. It’s a small world. So I got to know Lew a little in his post-HP time and came to feel that the Agilent spinoff was Lew punting.
Let me explain. We’ve all heard how great it is that Google allows its employees to spend 10 percent of their time working on their own projects. Google didn’t invent that: HP did. And the way the process was instituted at HP was quite formal in that the 10 percent time was after lunch on Fridays. Imagine what it must have been like on Friday afternoons in Palo Alto with every engineer working on some wild-ass idea. And the other part of the system was that those engineers had access to what they called “lab stores” — anything needed to do the job, whether it was a microscope or a magnetron or a barrel of acetone could be taken without question on Friday afternoons from the HP warehouses. This enabled a flurry of innovation that produced some of HP’s greatest products including those printers.

[nrc]

Gee, almost billion in profit on around 9 billion in revenue annually. There's just no money in it. :rolleyes:

This is just another round of bean counters and MBAs driving a company into the ground chasing quarterly earnings and the whims of Wall Street. IBM and HP are the Chrysler and GM of the new century. We can only hope that we have the sense not to bail them out when the eventually crater.

This practice of throwing out low margin consumer products like they're yesterday's bad sushi is going to doom another round of American companies. Alternate cycles of "diversifying" and "divesting" eventually will send some of these companies into a death spiral.

The bottom line is that if you can't execute on a $500 piece of consumer electronics, why should I trust you to execute on a million dollar enterprise software suite?

[TKGAngel]

Since my 3-year-old HP laptop went to computer heaven this week, this news is not making me want to buy another HP as a replacement. Any recommendations on another brand? (Other than Apple. They're a bit out of my price range.)

[dando]

Since my 3-year-old HP laptop went to computer heaven this week, this news is not making me want to buy another HP as a replacement. Any recommendations on another brand? (Other than Apple. They're a bit out of my price range.)

I'm still using Dell, but it's mostly a mosh pit on the low-end PC side.

-Kevin

[KLang]

Good article in today's WSJ about how the other parts of HP are tied into their PC business (pay article). Glad I don't own any HP.

We've mostly switched to Macs but if I were in the market for a Windows PC I'd likely go with Dell.

[dando]

And the idiots are still promoting it on hp.com with the stupid Russell Brand ad. :shakehead Tons of comments on slickdeals.com, etc. about issues trying to order them with the reduced price. :saywhat: :shakehead

http://h41112.www4.hp.com/promo/webos/us/en/tablet/touchpad.html

Must be awaiting the returns from BBY, WMT, etc. :laugh:

-Kevin

[racer2c]

Gee, almost billion in profit on around 9 billion in revenue annually. There's just no money in it. :rolleyes:

This is just another round of bean counters and MBAs driving a company into the ground chasing quarterly earnings and the whims of Wall Street. IBM and HP are the Chrysler and GM of the new century. We can only hope that we have the sense not to bail them out when the eventually crater.

This practice of throwing out low margin consumer products like they're yesterday's bad sushi is going to doom another round of American companies. Alternate cycles of "diversifying" and "divesting" eventually will send some of these companies into a death spiral.

The bottom line is that if you can't execute on a $500 piece of consumer electronics, why should I trust you to execute on a million dollar enterprise software suite?

Like.

[nrc]

As someone who experienced Carly's mismanagement first hand I'd love to hang the whole thing on her. But they had plenty of opportunities to right the ship after she was run off and they'd done some stuff right and a lot of things wrong in that time.

Fiorina is just one more example of the kind of management that is destroying American businesses one at a time.

I was wondering if they could have possibly handled this worse, but they did do one right thing. They're giving all buyers a price match to the new fire sale price. Best Buy is allowing anyone who bought one to return it, which I suppose HP is taking the hit for.

Other than that, this is like having a third place race horse, shooting it in the head and then asking if anyone wants to buy a horse.

[WickerBill]

When their only hardware is servers, how long do you trust them to stay in that business?

I ask that because I'm a buyer of 1000+ HP servers a year right now. :shakehead

[nrc]

When their only hardware is servers, how long do you trust them to stay in that business?

I ask that because I'm a buyer of 1000+ HP servers a year right now. :shakehead

You raise a good point. x86 servers are basically a commodity now as well. This is why you need a Blade System. A Blade System is a way to convert commodity x86 servers into proprietary servers that will help you buy enough software and services to generate higher profit margins for your supplier. This will keep them interested and ensure regular visits from sales people anxious to discuss new opportunities to enhance their annual bonus.

[dando]

I'm seeing TV spots advertising the Touchpad starting @ $399. :saywhat:

-Kevin

[WickerBill]

This is why you need a Blade System.

hahaha

I am so glad I'm not the only blade-hater around.

[TKGAngel]

I'm seeing TV spots advertising the Touchpad starting @ $399. :saywhat:

-Kevin

Could be a couple reasons why that's happening. Most TV stations have a two week cancellation window, meaning anything you cancel within two weeks of the day you make the cancel call, you are on the hook for cost wise. Also, if HP didn't have a new spot at the ready to replace the touchpad spots (that they spent a lot of money to produce), they may have decided to just let the spots ride until something new is ready.

I'm willing to bet HP and their ad agency(ies) are scrambling at the moment.

[Ankf00]

When their only hardware is servers, how long do you trust them to stay in that business?

I ask that because I'm a buyer of 1000+ HP servers a year right now. :shakehead
Fair enough, but lack of consumer products doesn't hinder Oracle


Gee, almost billion in profit on around 9 billion in revenue annually. There's just no money in it. :rolleyes:

the pc division runs a 5.7% profit margin vs. 7.9% for the corp, which gets closer to 10% w/o PC unit. revenues are trending down the past 3 years and the new direction of mobile devices is further threatening that. their operating margin is 10.5% which is far behind their competitors.

from the WSJ


We're going to demote the PC and the Mac," Mr. Jobs said, speaking at the company's developer conference in June.

Hewlett-Packard said it is exploring a spinoff of its PC business as the technology giant lowered its financial targets for the third time this year. Dennis Berman has details on The News Hub.

Hewlett-Packard Co. performed its own dramatic demotion Thursday, as the world's largest PC supplier disclosed it is considering plans that include a spinoff or sale of its personal-systems group, which brought in $40.74 billion in sales during its last fiscal year, or about a third of the company's total revenue. H-P shipped more than 64 million PCs during 2010, or about 18.5% of the total PC market, according IDC.

The "post-PC era," as Mr. Jobs calls it, underscores several sharp changes in the behavior of both consumers and corporations that are shifting growth to the likes of Apple and Google Inc., and away from PC stalwarts like H-P and Dell Inc.

The move by H-P to exit the PC business bookended a tumultuous week for the technology industry, in which search giant Google agreed to pay $12.5 billion to acquire Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc., in a bid to strengthen its position in the smartphone industry and its patent position.
Computing, once tied to desktops, is increasingly carried out on pocket-sized devices or so-called cloud services that manage corporate operations and send data to mobile users.

Sales of traditional PCs—most of them running Microsoft Corp.'s Windows operating system and chips based on designs by Intel Corp.—are growing at an anemic rate, rising just 2.6% during the second quarter, according to IDC.

Stiff competition has squeezed manufacturers' prices and profits. The current rule of thumb is that manufacturers like H-P can expect to make a profit margin of 2% to 6% on PCs, while analysts estimate Apple's profit margin in the mid-teens for its Macintosh computers.

At the same time, mobile devices like Apple's iPhone and iPad are drawing many consumers away from the laptop models that have driven the PC business lately. They are good enough for what most consumers do—surfing to websites and playing simple games—and are also proving attractive for business chores like presentations. Apple said in a June earnings call that 91% of Fortune 500 companies have deployed or tested the iPhone while 86% of them have deployed or tested the iPad.

The H-P decision mirrors that of International Business Machines Corp., which once led the market but acknowledged the changing industry with the 2005 sale of its PC business to China's Lenovo Group Ltd.

"H-P was the biggest seller of PCs in the world, but they have concluded that's tied to looking backwards and they need to look forwards," said Brad Silverberg, a venture capitalist and former Microsoft executive. He called the H-P move "another tectonic shift" providing further evidence of a post-PC world.

Not that H-P has done badly in the business. It outdueled Dell, for example, to take the No. 1 spot in PCs several years ago.

Jean-Louis Gassée, a former Apple and H-P executive who is now a venture capitalist, credited H-P executives with tight management of the hardware production process. But they couldn't change the underlying reality that there is little profit to be made in the business.

"It's structural. It's not bad management," said Mr. Gassée. "A competent manager could add a point or two of profit margin, but that still doesn't make it a business. It's a commodity."


spin off while it's of value, invest that money in something that will help generate greater margin aligned w/ the business model. HP long ago left behind being a "technology" company in favor of an IT company.

[nrc]

hahaha

I am so glad I'm not the only blade-hater around.

I came into this year skeptical but willing to be convinced. After studying the various offerings I've gone from skeptical to cynical.

[dando]

A good summary on how much of a fuster cluck this has been for HP:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-20095208-92/hps-touchpad-fire-sale-the-fallout/?tag=topStories

-Kevin

[KLang]

Hard to imagine how HP could have handled the last week worse.

I do hope the consumer printer division survives. We've got an OfficeJet L7680 All-in-One at home that has been great.

[WickerBill]

Hard to imagine how HP could have handled the last week worse.

I do hope the consumer printer division survives. We've got an OfficeJet L7680 All-in-One at home that has been great.

http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets/images/4/2006/11/medium_BloodInk.jpg


I bet they'll keep the printer thing going.

[SurfaceUnits]

Since my 3-year-old HP laptop went to computer heaven this week, this news is not making me want to buy another HP as a replacement. Any recommendations on another brand? (Other than Apple. They're a bit out of my price range.)

this is a great deal, nomatter what chinese company built it

http://www.staples.com/HP-g7-1150us-17.3-Laptop/product_332977_HC2

I've have gotten a few for some customers

[KLang]

I think I would be concerned about support a few years down the road with an HP PC.

[dando]

Hard to imagine how HP could have handled the last week worse.

I do hope the consumer printer division survives. We've got an OfficeJet L7680 All-in-One at home that has been great.

We have a LaserJet IIIp that is still kicking ~13 years later. Albeit some of the newer PDF file sizes are causing memory overloads. :\

-Kevin

[Insomniac]

I think I would be concerned about support a few years down the road with an HP PC.

I imagine whoever buys the division will keep everyone covered. A few years down the road, the warranty is up and it is very obsolete. Anyone have to deal with the IBM to Lenovo transition?

[TKGAngel]

I think I would be concerned about support a few years down the road with an HP PC.

That's my worry. My laptop lasted three years before it died. And what limited help HP provided last week was kind of helpful. I don't want to have the fear of the unknown tech support guy hanging over my head.

[Ankf00]

I think I would be concerned about support a few years down the road with an HP PC.

just bought a new HP laptop, i-7 quad, with 8gb memory & 2gb video so I can run complex engineering models.

I imagine it'll probably be fine though, they're not shutting down that line of business, it's either a spinoff or a sale, there's revenue, market, and profit to be had for some operations/supply chain nerd executive out there who's a pig in **** when it comes to squeezing nickles and dimes out of processes. and the value is the existing product line and existing market, would be dumb to not support that. one possibility is flextronics buys it and make the transition asus has into a products.

[KLang]

Probably it will be OK. I do wonder though how much of their PC customer base will still be around when they get done deciding what they are going to do. Will there really be anything left to sell or spin off? They seem to have shot themselves in the foot with this, IMO, premature announcement.

[Ankf00]

They seem to have shot themselves in the foot with this, IMO, premature announcement.

seemingly so.

[Ankf00]

A good summary on how much of a fuster cluck this has been for HP:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-20095208-92/hps-touchpad-fire-sale-the-fallout/?tag=topStories

-Kevin

good article, but the last 2 paragraphs don't carry much impact for hp, tablet pricing? hp doesn't care anymore, sucks for everyone else. with retailers, hp's consumer product presence is significantly cut after this, so having the best relationships isn't of much value to them anymore either.

[Andrew Longman]

good article, but the last 2 paragraphs don't carry much impact for hp, tablet pricing? hp doesn't care anymore, sucks for everyone else. with retailers, hp's consumer product presence is significantly cut after this, so having the best relationships isn't of much value to them anymore either.
The last two paragraphs also show exactly why long term HP needed to get out of the business. It is a race to the bottom. They can be desperate now or later. Their choice. The desperation party is less crowded just now.

Only Apple can charge a premium and that is dubious without perpetual class leading design... or even then.

HP needs to find a new business. Maybe they could buy F1. Or ALMS. :gomer:

p.s. printers... I don't know if it is still true but a while back HP made the guts for just about half of the printers sold. If that is still true, may be less of a reason to worry about printers. They used to be the worlds expert.

[Cam]

I imagine whoever buys the division will keep everyone covered. A few years down the road, the warranty is up and it is very obsolete. Anyone have to deal with the IBM to Lenovo transition?

To this day all Lenovo parts and warranty info comes from a .ibm.com served website. Call the 1-300 number for Lenovo hardware support and the bloke on the other end here answers the phone with an Aussie accent from a call centre in Queensland. Lenovo support is the least painless I have had to deal with among the biggies. :thumbup:

[Ankf00]

The last two paragraphs also show exactly why long term HP needed to get out of the business. It is a race to the bottom. They can be desperate now or later. Their choice. The desperation party is less crowded just now.

yep. personally, I really wish HP had been able to build and grow a competitive consumer mobile division that meshed with their enterprise offerings. wanting hp to grow and kick ass is the same as wanting ford to grow and kicka ss is the same as wanting exxon mobil to grow and kick ass, america, **** yeah. but pumping out widgets, depending on volume, is a completely different game from offering value, which is what they want to focus on

[WickerBill]

The problem is that they aren't Oracle; they don't have a single-minded despot in charge; and honestly they suck pretty badly at enterprise software and (especially since the fold-in of EDS) at service delivery.

[racer2c]

the-7-immutable-laws-of-innovation--follow-them-or-risk-the-consequences (http://philmckinney.com/archives/2011/08/the-7-immutable-laws-of-innovation-%E2%80%93-follow-them-or-risk-the-consequences.html)

Innovate or sit down.

[nrc]

The problem is that they aren't Oracle; they don't have a single-minded despot in charge; and honestly they suck pretty badly at enterprise software and (especially since the fold-in of EDS) at service delivery.

Exactly. Moreover, Larry Ellison doesn't give a crap what Wall Street thinks. He's understands that he needs to have enough control of the commodities that are the foundation for his megalith to ensure that no one can undermine him. And moreover, if those commodities are essential to your business, then understanding how to monetize them is the key to keeping them affordable. Apple and Google understand this as well.

HP doesn't get it. Either the profit margins cited for their PC business don't include all the software and services that their installed base should drag with it, or they've utterly failed to deliver on that.

It doesn't get any better for them. Apotheker has already nearly destroyed one enterprise software company. HP's offerings in that area are no great shakes so they'll almost certainly have to gut that part of the company to make way for their new Autonomy offerings. That will upset even more customers along the way.

HPs problems leading up to this have had little to do with positioning and a lot to do with execution. This is amputating a limb to cure a virus.

[Ankf00]

Exactly. Moreover, Larry Ellison doesn't give a crap what Wall Street thinks. He's understands that he needs to have enough control of the commodities that are the foundation for his megalith to ensure that no one can undermine him. And moreover, if those commodities are essential to your business, then understanding how to monetize them is the key to keeping them affordable. Apple and Google understand this as well.


while apple is selling a greater ecosystem, they're not selling hardware at cost plus. they're a product design house every bit as much as they are a tech firm, and they're skilled at maximizing market, margin, and volume, and that hardware is integral to their core strategy.

the pc divsion isn't a foundation of hp's core strategy overall and hasn't been for a few years. it's nice the division is there to pull some profit, but it's worth something right now due to market & brand value, and that worth can be better put to use as investment capital towards gains in other higher margin business, assuming the gains are there to be made (which they are) and that's the direction the market will play out long term (which it seems it might be).

HP is expanding the amount of hardware offerings that backup their services & software side, even to the scale of data centers & purchasing a CivE firm to do the data center design & buildout. this is in the same vein as oracle buying up sun.


It doesn't get any better for them. Apotheker has already nearly destroyed one enterprise software company. HP's offerings in that area are no great shakes so they'll almost certainly have to gut that part of the company to make way for their new Autonomy offerings. That will upset even more customers along the way.

HPs problems leading up to this have had little to do with positioning and a lot to do with execution. This is amputating a limb to cure a virus.

failure in executing the strategy is different from bad strategy. overpaying for 3par and autonomy is the former, but the decision to pursue those kinds of acquisitions is the right play if HP's priority is regaining a place in the valley alongside oracle/ibm. instead of issuing debt or equity, they're selling a valuable, lower margin asset this time around. however, at no point will that pc division generate 15 point margins in the future. putting that capital to best use, on the other hand...

[Andrew Longman]

the-7-immutable-laws-of-innovation--follow-them-or-risk-the-consequences (http://philmckinney.com/archives/2011/08/the-7-immutable-laws-of-innovation-%E2%80%93-follow-them-or-risk-the-consequences.html)

Innovate or sit down.

Accurate in my experience. I've always liked his writing.

Did you post that knowing Phil McKinney is VP and CTO of Hewlett-Packard's Personal Systems Group?

Ironic.

[chop456]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904787404576535211589514334.html

[Andrew Longman]

Ouch.

I knew all that, but when you put it in one place it looks so much worse.

I forgot about Pat Dunn's ridiculous spying scandal though. That, in hindsight, really shows how out of control and lost the board/leadership has been.

Only a massive change at the top can fix this. If there is anything left to fix.

[KLang]

Full page ad in WSJ today and Houston paper yesterday

Paraphrasing: No need to worry, we're spinning of the PC biz into a better company. Trust us!

[Elmo T]

Ouch.

I knew all that, but when you put it in one place it looks so much worse.



The only thing missing from that read is "The Aristocrats" punch line at the end. :saywhat:

[KLang]

Also in WSJ today, HP is going to produce more TouchPads to sell at a loss. :saywhat:

[SteveH]

I read that some company, possibly Samsung? was intersted in acquiring WebOS or whatever OS the Touchpad runs on. If so, it might make sense to expand the installed base of the product to drive up the value of the software. Or not. :confused:

[Ankf00]

Also in WSJ today, HP is going to produce more TouchPads to sell at a loss. :saywhat:

http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs42/f/2009/093/5/9/Double_Facepalm_by_ScotlandForLife.jpg

[dando]

Also in WSJ today, HP is going to produce more TouchPads to sell at a loss. :saywhat:

Why not? Why **** up the fuster cluck and Epic. Fail.? :gomer:

-Kevin

[KLang]

From WSJ:

http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/MK-BO725_HPTOUC_NS_20110830193012.jpg

Makes perfect sense. :saywhat:

Actually I did read somewhere the suppliers are pissed about being stuck with parts for the things.

[Ankf00]

:rofl:

board now considering firing Apotheker

[dando]

:rofl:

board now considering firing Apotheker

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20109493-17/meg-whitman-for-hp-ceo-board-eyes-change/?tag=topStories

To be replaced by Meg Whitman? :eek:

-Kevin

[Napoleon]

To be replaced by Meg Whitman? :eek:

It is time for me to short my first stock.

[nrc]

Ha Ha!

Of course, it's unlikely to fix anything. Obviously the BOD is part of the problem. It's about products, services, and customers, stupid.

[Napoleon]

Idea of Whitman at HP distresses the tech world (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/22/technology/idea-of-whitman-at-hp-distresses-the-tech-world.html?hp)

[nrc]

Whitman it is. What a bunch of maroons. :shakehead

Is HP's Board the Worst Ever? (http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/22/technology/hp_board/index.htm)

[nissan gtp]

Is HP's Board the Worst Ever? (http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/22/technology/hp_board/index.htm)

Yes.

[KLang]

And now HP has decided they are going to keep their PC business after all. What a cluster..

[Ankf00]

got a touchpad last week. thicker & heavier than ipad but it was 100. webos is super slick.

[nrc]

got a touchpad last week. thicker & heavier than ipad but it was 100. webos is super slick.

Grumble. Yes. WebOS is awesome. The world sucks for not letting me have anything nice. :irked:

[Ankf00]

I hope this iPhone pic posted over Tapatalk can tide you over!

[KLang]

Shutdown of webOS division imminent? (http://www.engadget.com/2011/10/28/the-guardian-hp-shutdown-of-webos-division-said-to-be-imminent/)

Story about HP in todays WSJ said Whitman would be studying it.

[nrc]

I hope this iPhone pic posted over Tapatalk can tide you over!

Grumble.

[nrc]

Woot! (oh it's a woot-off btw) had the stupid things for $250. grumble. Meanwhile HP is hemming and hawing about whether they're actually going to dump WebOS.

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/243448/hp_delays_decision_on_fate_of_webos.html

[chop456]

I hope this iPhone pic posted over Tapatalk can tide you over!

Nice Epicurious app, loser! :laugh:


What do you mean 'how do you know what it looks like?'

[Insomniac]

Lengthy article on the inside story of the death of Palm and webOS: http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/5/3062611/palm-webos-hp-inside-story-pre-postmortem

[nrc]

Similar story of HP's dysfunction and decline during the same period.

http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/05/08/500-hp-apotheker/

Such a pity. In spite of all their missteps, Palm did manage to create a UI and OS that is still better than Android in many ways. They're simply a victim of not having money to put into the hardware and the carriers not really wanting to support more platforms than they absolutely have to. RIM will be next and M$FT will have to continue pouring cash into mobile to get a foot in the door.

[Ankf00]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324048904578318530185896830.html?m od=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection

HP margins down 16%, Dell took 31% hit in the latest quarter.

Staying in a commoditized segment is recipe for fail.

[nrc]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324048904578318530185896830.html?m od=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection

HP margins down 16%, Dell took 31% hit in the latest quarter.

Staying in a commoditized segment is recipe for fail.

Nothing wrong with a loss leader. You just have to have something to differentiate yourself and products and services that you can upsell. Dell and HP have failed to innovate or create exciting new products. When companies that size rely on acquisitions for key technologies it's a fundamental failure of management.

[Insomniac]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324048904578318530185896830.html?m od=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection

HP margins down 16%, Dell took 31% hit in the latest quarter.

Staying in a commoditized segment is recipe for fail.

More like a recipe to not make as much money. :) HP just had a huge write down, otherwise they're making money.

[Ankf00]

More like a recipe to not make as much money. :) HP just had a huge write down, otherwise they're making money.

the numbers are year over year for this past quarter, the writedown is a big effect on the last financials but isn't a part of these numbers from the operations, the numbers are down for every business unit from this quarter last year, and stock's down 62% over 3 years...


Nothing wrong with a loss leader. You just have to have something to differentiate yourself and products and services that you can upsell. Dell and HP have failed to innovate or create exciting new products. When companies that size rely on acquisitions for key technologies it's a fundamental failure of management.

loss leaders are not supposed to be such a significant part of the business, which the pc division is. and they're supposed to drive gains.

About acquisitions being failure of management, it's not true. Even R&D shops like GE and Google live off of acquisitions. GE's just launched a new global mining business unit based off of 2 big acquisitions. Diversified industrials like Emerson, ABB, Schneider are pretty much acquisition central. ExxonMobil isn't the most prolific producer of north american gas without acquiring XTO, and Statoil isn't Rosneft's only other partner in the middle of Siberia after XOM without acquiring Brigham.

Properly targeting, financing, and integrating the acquisition, that's the real separator. Not organic vs. inorganic growth.

And even if the PC division is removed from the books, doesn't mean there can't be any strategic relationship. Spin it off, sell to a partner, sell w/ contractual terms giving preference, etc.

[Insomniac]

the numbers are year over year for this past quarter, the writedown is a big effect on the last financials but isn't a part of these numbers from the operations, the numbers are down for every business unit from this quarter last year, and stock's down 62% over 3 years...

Numbers are definitely down, just saying they could stay there quite a while before fail. Investors may not like it, but they are still able to extract some profit from the business of selling PCs/Laptops/Servers.

[nrc]

lAbout acquisitions being failure of management, it's not true.

Ok, my comment was overly broad. There are a lot of different reasons to do acquisitions and not all of them represent a failure of management. Doing acquisitions because you simply can't grow fast enough or because you're moving into a new market is very different than doing an acquisition because you can't innovate internally, your own products have failed, or you've failed to recognize market directions and trends.

Most of HP's recent acquisitions have been the latter. Even Google has had its share of those. The core of Google's brilliance is monetizing seemingly worthless commodities.

[dando]

Ok, my comment was overly broad. There are a lot of different reasons to do acquisitions and not all of them represent a failure of management. Doing acquisitions because you simply can't grow fast enough or because you're moving into a new market is very different than doing an acquisition because you can't innovate internally, your own products have failed, or you've failed to recognize market directions and trends.

Most of HP's recent acquisitions have been the latter. Even Google has had its share of those. The core of Google's brilliance is monetizing seemingly worthless commodities.

Been there, done that. AOL > CompuServe > Netscape > Time Warner Fail.

Yet I'm one of the few that survived the nuclear (or nuculear) winter. :gomer:

-Kevin

[Ankf00]

Ok, my comment was overly broad. There are a lot of different reasons to do acquisitions and not all of them represent a failure of management. Doing acquisitions because you simply can't grow fast enough or because you're moving into a new market is very different than doing an acquisition because you can't innovate internally, your own products have failed, or you've failed to recognize market directions and trends.

Most of HP's recent acquisitions have been the latter. Even Google has had its share of those. The core of Google's brilliance is monetizing seemingly worthless commodities.

completely agree on the latter. the former, it depends, pretty much agree on the last point on failure of mkt trends.

But I will say that if you have the right mgmt that knows how to choose, finance, and properly integrate those targets then that company can successfully make up for lack of innovation and product failure. Letting micro and midcaps take on the risk and financial liability and the time suck involved with innovation/prod dev, that allows major corps which know how to pick and integrate to lead in new markets.

[nrc]

Speaking of HP acquisition failures, HP has sold the remains of their WebOS (nee Palm) business to LG. LG plans to use it as an OS for their Smart TVs. Better than completely dead but little hope resurrection on mobile devices. Pity since I still prefer it to Android.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57570990-94/webos-lives-lg-to-resurrect-it-for-smart-tvs/