RUMOR: HP getting out of the PC business?

It pains me to think that such large companies collapse in on themselves like a dying sun. Out of all of their power, energy and resources they still can't help imploding in on themselves. If it ever actually happens, then I will heavily believe that they deserved it.

I can never figure out why leaders with arrogant and cocky views that they are always #1 are allowed to call any shots as opposed to simply diverting their focus on keeping order within the company.

Why not re-kindle their consumer PC business by setting up an inspirational and functional environment with a few ambitious and passionate product and graphics designers, researchers and engineers. It wouldn't have to cost much, considering the amount of unnecessary staff that likely exist as it is when it comes to dumb decisions such as, "Should we make the logo glow?". Maybe I'm just inexperienced in the world of enterprises, but allowing your "livestock" to free roam will likely deliver much better results.

 

Like Governments, Companies also get bloated and turn bureaucratic monsters that eat themselves, in this sense Apotheker maybe wasn't wrong if he realised that HP was too big to manage itself. But from everything i have read it doesn't seem that was the reason.

 

They should at least consider the construction of an LLC that is under independent leadership for consumer products...sort of like what EA does for some of it's branches - only in this case they would be constructing unique laptop and desktop hardware as opposed to ruining video games.

 

I'd like to bring Voodoo and Palm back from the dead.

 

The more I read, the more it seems that Apotheker was the fall guy for the fact that HP is near the brink of imploding.

Since his departure, not a single person from HP's leadership has repudiated the road map that Apotheker was the architect of. Not Ray Lane, not Meg Whitman, no one. In fact, they have said the opposite: that Apotheker's grand plan remains fully in effect. TRANSLATION: Apotheker is gone, but his plan isn't.

(This is a good read of someone's take on what's really going on at HP Who holds the reins at HP? It ain't just Whitman. | ZDNet)

For the last 5 years, Hurd has cut fat off of HP to meet investors' goals. There is now no more fat to be cut. And by investing half the R&D compared to their competitors, HP doesn't have a strategic placement for the future.

For HP to survive, they need to move away from hardware (and low profit margins) into software. And they must begin reinvesting now. To revitalize both PSG and EBD is too much. Thus, the (low margin) PSG must go.

Also

source: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/howlett/will-ousting-apotheker-at-hp-make-any-difference/3446

 

That depends. If HP wants to be a consumer brand with hundreds of millions of costumers or if does not.

A consumer brand in itself can be considered more solid even with less profit per $ of investment.

 

Thank God HP is going, their PC's are crap. 2 of my family members and 1 friend purchased HP's, all fell apart. Constant problems, things breaking, with crappy support.

My 5 year old Sony VAIO and my 3 year old Dell XPS laptops have never needed extra maintenance. Those crap HPs fell apart in a year.

 

I don't know that I'd call the Pavilion line low-end. It ranges from moderate to high-end these days. The G series is low-end.

 

I've never understood the vitriol HP inspired. All my laptops have been HP, and they've all functioned pretty well. The current one, an Envy 17, and its predecessor, a dv6000, have been excellent.

 

Looks like HP has decided to stay in the PC business here's a link to the press release
HP says it won't spin off personal computer unit: Associated Press Business News - MSN Money

 

Me too. My predecessors included a Compag Evo N2000v and Pavilion dv6700z. And those where just the notebooks. I've own at least three other HP desktops and a couple of printers; numerous other HP branded accessories - Overall, I have always been pleased with the performance of these units.

 

My experience with HP computers has been mostly positive.

My first HP computer was a Pavilion XE783 desktop (700MHz Celeron), which didn't always power up properly. It was in my possession for 7 months but because it wasn't very reliable, I rarely used it.

Then, I had an nc2400 laptop for just over a year and liked everything about it except its ultra crappy screen.

More recently, I owned a Mini 5101 netbook for about 9 months. It has got to be one of the highest quality netbooks ever made, and I liked it almost as much as the nc2400. Impressively, it survived an orange juice spill onto half of the keyboard. But eventually I sold it because I could never get used to its super low res of 1366x768.

Last week, I bought an HP 8200 Elite desktop from buy.com and have been extremely pleased with it. I bought it because I needed a sub-$1,000 Core i7-2600 desktop computer with at least two PCI slots and at least three 3.5" HDD bays, and this HP was the only one that met all these criteria. My only quibble is that I find Dell's Precision and OptiPlex desktops look somewhat more attractive.