HP Lays Off Hundreds of Former Palm Employees Discussion

[hal]

eBay certainly flourished under her administration, but the general consensus of most of the histories of eBay which have been written is that that is owed entirely to the fact that the internet exploded during that time period, and eBay had the luck to become the de facto online auction site. Basically, the position taken by most of the former eBay people is that they could have done exactly as well as they did with two slices of burnt whole wheat toast for a CEO.

Pretty much a success based on letting the horse run at its own pace, not quite deciding much over it.

(...) hey! she imported the Teletubbies

You mean it? Shoot her

[tmedvick]

While Whitman suggested that Leo's path would be followed, she did suggest she would be reviewing the initiatives.

Ray Lane, new Executive Director of the Board, said, “If it can’t be stronger on the outside then it stays inside. It’ll be the easiest decision we ever made — investors and customers will tell us.”

HP Price on August 17th: $31.39
HP Price now: $21.54

It's like truth is knocking at their door and they are saying, "Go away, I'm looking for the truth."

[r0k]

While Whitman suggested that Leo's path would be followed, she did suggest she would be reviewing the initiatives.

Ray Lane, new Executive Director of the Board, said, “If it can’t be stronger on the outside then it stays inside. It’ll be the easiest decision we ever made — investors and customers will tell us.”

HP Price on August 17th: $31.39
HP Price now: $21.54

It's like truth is knocking at their door and they are saying, "Go away, I'm looking for the truth."

You don't fire the top guy and then say "We're going to follow where he led." The guy was an idiot. We knew it before HP's board. So now that they have caught on and fired him, they say they are going down the same path?

As quickly as possible HP needs to show a new direction. HP needs to keep the PC unit (not some nebulous non-statement about if this or if that). HP is the 800 pound gorilla in PC manufacturing. All it takes to remain there is a simple press release.

I would also say HP needs to bring back webOS devices of some sort before webOS becomes irrelevant. HP is in an untenable position right now. How about calculators running webOS? Something has gotta change and change fast if HP is to avoid imploding.

[tmedvick]

If the news of the day is to be trusted, Whitman will simply pick up where Apotheker left off. The board apparently feels that he had the right idea, but simply implemented it badly.

If this is true, HP is more screwed now than before.

[Varjak]

BTW, I checked into this: Meg Whitman was on Goldman Sachs' board for three months (Oct. 2001 to Dec. 2001). Not what I'd call a substantive association.

[hal]

I wonder what's in HP execs' heads by pulling the plug off all the PC business. It's one of their major fields. Besides, when you make such a move, the best expectations involve turning the whole asset into money. In the current economy, what's gonna happen, a true good sale, or a firesale? When IBM did the same thing with their laptop division, a good bidder and digital tech player came in, Lenovo, but it doesn't mean it's gonna happen every time anybody feels like it. In a different example, for each Yahoo!-level email provider, there's a million of email minions; putting an email business on the sales shelf doesn't mean that a Yahoo will come and get it.

[Hook]

I wonder what's in HP execs' heads by pulling the plug off all the PC business. It's one of their major fields. Besides, when you make such a move, the best expectations involve turning the whole asset into money. In the current economy, what's gonna happen, a true good sale, or a firesale? When IBM did the same thing with their laptop division, a good bidder and digital tech player came in, Lenovo, but it doesn't mean it's gonna happen every time anybody feels like it. In a different example, for each Yahoo!-level email provider, there's a million of email minions; putting an email business on the sales shelf doesn't mean that a Yahoo will come and get it.

Actually, the IBM example was almost a natural move. Lenovo made the Thinkpad for IBM, then IBM sold the unit to them and they just put their name on it. They had been making them all along, which is why Thinkpads are still some of the best laptops. Not cutting edge and not lightweights, but built like tanks.

[r0k]

Actually, the IBM example was almost a natural move. Lenovo made the Thinkpad for IBM, then IBM sold the unit to them and they just put their name on it. They had been making them all along, which is why Thinkpads are still some of the best laptops. Not cutting edge and not lightweights, but built like tanks.

I went to a conference where the Lenovo guys where showing videos of the stuff they did to their laptops to demonstrate how well they were built.

In one video, they put the laptop loose in the lap of a crash test dummy and then rammed the sled into a wall at 35 mph. The bezel flew off. The laptop flexed severely. But as the camera zoomed in on the display, the OS was still running. The HDD had parked when the sensor detected the crash. Video here.

In another video, some Lenovo guys went to the third level of a parking structure and threw the laptop from there to the ground. The guy filming walked up, turned over the laptop and again the OS was still running. I couldn't find a link to the parking structure video but I did find one where they dropped it just about as far from the ceiling during a trade show here.

If I wanted a PC laptop, Lenovo would be on my short list over HP, Toshiba, Sony or Dell. HP can't repeat what IBM did because there isn't a company like Lenovo ready to walk in and pick up the business. Maybe Dell would happily snap it up. Maybe Acer or even Asus. But it would be nothing like the transition from IBM to Lenovo where all the manufacturing pretty much stayed put and only the name changed. And unlike IBM, HP doesn't have a "premium" brand. It's the biggest seller but not as highly regarded (as IBM was) in terms of build quality or customer support.