News - HP confirms CEO coup

[HEXUS]

Meg Whitman is in as CEO, but Ray Lane as exec chairman could be just as important.

Read more.

[crossy]

Do you get the impression Apotheker's communication skills weren't held in very high regard by the HP board? Clearly the bungled communication of the Palm/PC group/Autonomy announcement did for Apotheker.

Buying Autonomy was probably a good idea - buying it for so much money - less so.

Announcing the sell-off of PSG (desktops, laptops, etc) the way they did was a Class-A brain dead moment. And personally, even if HP are going to be an "enterprise company" those enterprises will still need laptops and desktops to talk to those back-office/datacentre servers, plus having the consumer business gets the HP name "out there". Don't think of it as a slim margin business, but more as "cheap advertising".

And I still think they should bring back webOS - even in some restricted capability. To me at least tablets are a great way to sell cloud computing etc.

[3dcandy]

Replace a clueless ceo with an even more clueless ceo! Way to go HP, no wonder your shares are tanking right now, then you won't be able to give away the psg group let alone sell it off

[crossy]

Replace a clueless ceo with an even more clueless ceo! Way to go HP, no wonder your shares are tanking right now, then you won't be able to give away the psg group let alone sell it off

Sorry, I'm going to disagree that "Leo the CEO" was "clueless". Sure, his vision of HP didn't necessarily tally with that of everyone else - and I'm pretty sure that everyone agrees that the PSG announcement was screwed up badly.

Similarly, MW knows a lot about selling to consumers - even the pro-MarkTurd faction will admit that. And don't forget that MW is partnered with Ray Lane - an experienced ex-Oracle guy who the US papers are saying knows a good deal about selling to businesses. And I used the word "partnered" with good reason - this much was very obvious from the talk-to-the-troops. I prefer to reserve judgement on the new management until I see more of their style.

As to PSG it was made very plain that they want to spin it off with more independence, not sell it to Acer, Lenovo, etc. So it'll still be a part of HP, but maybe some kind of weird agency type arrangement - I've certainly seen that before.

Share price? When I checked it was up 3 cents in after hours trading.

[wasabi]

Trouble is the board don't want to see steady but low margins based on what the company does well (reliable dull enterprise kit). They see fads and quick bucks for little outlay on high margin software / services glitz. So far at least it hasn't hit the servers, SANs and so on side of things, but no doubt that'll get pushed aside too.

[3dcandy]

Sorry, I'm going to disagree that "Leo the CEO" was "clueless". Sure, his vision of HP didn't necessarily tally with that of everyone else - and I'm pretty sure that everyone agrees that the PSG announcement was screwed up badly.

Similarly, MW knows a lot about selling to consumers - even the pro-MarkTurd faction will admit that. And don't forget that MW is partnered with Ray Lane - an experienced ex-Oracle guy who the US papers are saying knows a good deal about selling to businesses. And I used the word "partnered" with good reason - this much was very obvious from the talk-to-the-troops. I prefer to reserve judgement on the new management until I see more of their style.

As to PSG it was made very plain that they want to spin it off with more independence, not sell it to Acer, Lenovo, etc. So it'll still be a part of HP, but maybe some kind of weird agency type arrangement - I've certainly seen that before.

Share price? When I checked it was up 3 cents in after hours trading.

Up 3 cents from a historic low price...Hmmmm
MW did very little with ebay, it's was on an upward curve and a monkey would have been able to run it...perhaps leo the ceo wasn't 100% clueless, but his tenure hasn't done hp any favours whatsoever and yet he will walk away with a great deal. ebay is a world away from the huge business that is hp, however I can't see her doing a worse job, that is practically impossible!

[crossy]

Up 3 cents from a historic low price...Hmmmm
MW did very little with ebay, it's was on an upward curve and a monkey would have been able to run it...perhaps leo the ceo wasn't 100% clueless, but his tenure hasn't done hp any favours whatsoever and yet he will walk away with a great deal. ebay is a world away from the huge business that is hp, however I can't see her doing a worse job, that is practically impossible!

Sorry (again) but your assessment is way off what everyone else seems to believe - e.g. Harvard Business Review voted her #8 in the list of 100 best performing CEO's (and the only woman) last year. http://hbr.org/2010/01/the-best-perf...the-world/ar/1.
And while Leo's "golden sod off" might rankle (okay, make that "does rankle"), it's no different to what's happened in the past. Heck even that s**mbag Mark Turd (remember who fiddled his expenses on more than one occasion - by his own admission) got out with a nice lil' earner. Still they're amateurs compared to the old EDS - Dick Brown nearly bankrupted the business and still managed to get out with an obscene payout.

Notice how everyone has focussed on MW, yet Ray Lane (chairman of the board remember) seems to have just as much power and responsibility. Yet, he doesn't seem to have that good a reputation - at least according to http://www.businessinsider.com/hp-ch...ay-lane-2011-9 and there's an interesting old post at CNet - namely http://news.cnet.com/2009-1001-243126.html - read that story and tell me that RL wouldn't welcome a chance to get some revenge against Oracle?

Trouble is the board don't want to see steady but low margins based on what the company does well (reliable dull enterprise kit). They see fads and quick bucks for little outlay on high margin software / services glitz. So far at least it hasn't hit the servers, SANs and so on side of things, but no doubt that'll get pushed aside too.

Incorrect - enterprise kit isn't low margin - why do you think that Leo was wanting to focus on it? Consumer business (PSG) on the other hand is low margin - and getting increasingly cut-throat, (and no, that's not due to Apple in any way!). Personally speaking I think there's NO chance that the servers/SAN will get "pushed aside". After all, what good is a services business with no hardware to deploy - can you really see HP Enterprise Services going cap in hand to Dell/IBM (the former being the preferred option for EDS before they became HPES) for servers when HP themselves make them?

Actually, at the risk of divulging a tiny amount of a mail I got this morning - there's going to be more focus on the HP on HP concept - HP services and software running on HP branded hardware.

[3dcandy]

Ok, my point, if perhaps I was too subtle to make it obvious is that they seem to have been a bit quick and rash to appoint a new ceo without a great deal of experience in the behemoth that is HP. Ray Lane is a completely different kettle of fish and seems a good appointment. I feel HP haven't learnt much, MW *could* be good, but like I said I believe anyone could have made a decent fist of ebay whilst she was there...

[crossy]

Ok, my point, if perhaps I was too subtle to make it obvious is that they seem to have been a bit quick and rash to appoint a new ceo without a great deal of experience in the behemoth that is HP. Ray Lane is a completely different kettle of fish and seems a good appointment. I feel HP haven't learnt much, MW *could* be good, but like I said I believe anyone could have made a decent fist of ebay whilst she was there...

I think we'll agree to disagree on the fruitfulness of eBay - according to the reports I've read, MW grabbed them by the scruff of the neck and really shook the culture up - took it to the level they needed at that point.

The rest of your post above I'm going to agree with though. I'm also going to agree with others that have said that Ann Livermore would have made a much more sensible choice than an outsider. Especially given that the board still seem to want to head away from consumer hardware and towards enterprise hardware and services - AL used to be the VP in charge of HP Enterprise Services, so she's got that experience, plus she's an HP "lifer". I'm wondering if Ray Lane is the real leader and MW's only there as a mouthpiece - I can't see AL being happy to do that.

One thing I'll be interested to see is whether the new team will maintain the culture change at the top that Leo seemed to foster. Mark Hurd (pauses to spit) always seemed to foster this male chauvinist approach - with the female VP's and directors reputedly getting less than their male colleagues. That said, MH's approach to the rest of the staff stunk too.

As you can tell from that previous paragraph I'm not a big fan of the ex-ex-CEO - grotty little greasy, self-serving, ....

So far the "Ray and Meg Show" seem to be making the right noises, so I'm inclined to cut 'em some slack for the moment.

[3dcandy]

Yeah, don't get me wrong MW was good at Ebay, what I meant, and probably didn't make clear, is that ebay was really doing so well that even if she wasn't superb, very good or even good, the company would have performed simply because of the momentum it had at that time. By all accounts she was very good at keeping that momentum going until the bubble burst, through no real fault of ebay. Female workers I'm afraid often get a bit of a rough deal...

MH was to all intents a knob....

[Scott B]

HP's share price was under $20 when Hurd was appointed and over $40 when he left - does that not count as mitigation in his favour?

[TheAnimus]

not knowing the dates and such, I'm not sure thats 100% fair, as many prices were depressed recently, and as such we need to see his performance measured in an "out performance" manner, against a basket of related firms.

For example a chimp in a suit could have taken over as CEO of BAML three years ago, and turned a massive increase in share price!

The handling of the touchpad, the consumer devision etc, was so dire someone has to suffer for it.

[Scott B]

not knowing the dates and such, I'm not sure thats 100% fair, as many prices were depressed recently, and as such we need to see his performance measured in an "out performance" manner, against a basket of related firms.

For example a chimp in a suit could have taken over as CEO of BAML three years ago, and turned a massive increase in share price!

The handling of the touchpad, the consumer devision etc, was so dire someone has to suffer for it.

The NYSE, on which HP is listed, was broadly flat between mid 2005, when Hurd took over from Carly Fiorina - who was broadly derided that the time - and mid 2010, when he left.

[crossy]

HP's share price was under $20 when Hurd was appointed and over $40 when he left - does that not count as mitigation in his favour?

If you're an HP shareholder that's planning to use the shares as a short-term investment, then - yes - Hurd was a god-send. Certainly, by all accounts, the investment houses loved him.

Problem is, and was, that Hurd was a "one trick pony" - his particular trick being to slash workforce and cut investment. Now while that might work for some companies, for a technology company, slashing R&D budgets is akin to urinating in the well you're drinking from.

Scott Adams (Mr Dilbert) covered the consequences in one of his books (Dilbert Future I think, but don't quote me on that). Namely, that once you start slash-n-burn on the workforce, the smart ones (the folks you want to keep) will start looking around for other jobs, to the detriment of the long term prospects for the company.

Worse still, I call j' accuse on Hurd for working very hard to foster a "them and us" culture. Sales droids were higher up than mere engineers; European workers were more expendable than US ones, but both were to be thrown over in favour of (lower paid?) Asian ones; women managers less "valued" than the guys; employees getting pay and benefit's cut at the time that board members were getting increased handouts, (e.g. Mrs Hurd got complimentary travel on the company jet hither and thither, meanwhile the plebs couldn't even get petrol money to go setup kit in a datacentre).

No, whatever his faults (and even I'll admit there were some colossal gaffs) Leo did start to turn that around, and stated from day 1 that "we're all a team" and appeared to mean it. Plus, although his vision was unarguably flawed, at least he (Leo) had a long term vision for the company. Hurd lacked that kind of vision, and seemed content to drive from one quarter to the next.

Hopefully, Hurd will do to Oracle what he tried to do to HP, then we'll see the 'wisdom' (or otherwise!) of his strategy - although I suspect Larry E will rein him in long before he can do any lasting damage. Meanwhile, I think we're in for an "interesting" time - what does the new management team want to do with/to HP long-term?