HP Splitting in Two
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So after years of himming and hawing, HP is finally splitting into two groups. This seems like a horrible decision to me and the names that they chose are even worse. The details are only just trickling in at this point.
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ArsTechnica has a better tech overview of how the two companies will be.
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Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
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Why is this bad? HP is leaving Dell as the only full stack supplier to the computing space. There is literally only one enterprise vendor left who can supply you your desktop, your laptop, your printer, your server, your switches and your storage. One, just one. There were two a few days ago. But today, just one. HP has left Dell with a pretty significant competitive advantage in the marketplace.
This matters a lot to the SMB world because just as IBM learned over a decade ago, the desktop, laptop and printer space is the "in" to get into SMBs. SMBs focus on the end user computing experience. They then buy servers, storage and other big ticket items from the company that sells them their end user devices. HP used to have a great funnel in their desktops leading customers to a single vendor solution that included the servers and storage. Now only Dell does that.
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@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
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@IRJ said:
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
Selling a failing business is completely different than splitting. Splitting leaves the same shareholders with all the same investments, just two different vehicles after the fact. It does not divest anything or offload it from an investor perspective.
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OMG! Wow!
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@IRJ said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
Gateway is still kinda around They got in bed with Acer.. Now Acer's quality is somewhat okay.. It's all low-end customer stuff though.
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@thecreativeone91 said:
@IRJ said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
Gateway is still kinda around They got in bed with Acer.. Now Acer's quality is somewhat okay.. It's all low-end customer stuff though.
Somewhat okay may be a bit of a generous statement. Before netbooks disappeared, that was their last domain where they made anything worthwhile. The only thing Acer makes that is any good now is monitors. Acer is the number one selling monitor in the country. But yup, all consumer computing gear.
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@ajstringham said:
@thecreativeone91 said:
@IRJ said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
Gateway is still kinda around They got in bed with Acer.. Now Acer's quality is somewhat okay.. It's all low-end customer stuff though.
Somewhat okay may be a bit of a generous statement. Before netbooks disappeared, that was their last domain where they made anything worthwhile. The only thing Acer makes that is any good now is monitors. Acer is the number one selling monitor in the country. But yup, all consumer computing gear.
No, the Acer Ultrabooks are great quality. The Netbooks not so much.
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@thecreativeone91 said:
@ajstringham said:
@thecreativeone91 said:
@IRJ said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@IRJ said:
Wow..... usually a company does this when they are in trouble, not thriving
Splitting itself is not a bad thing. This is actually what you do to better align a business, in theory. But this is splitting a single market in two and is very foolish in my book.
I remember when Gateway sold half their business to MPC. It tanked about a year later. I remember that very well because at the time I was a Gateway tech. We got totally screwed by MPC. We did about 4 months of work unpaid and then they filed bankruptcy.
Gateway is still kinda around They got in bed with Acer.. Now Acer's quality is somewhat okay.. It's all low-end customer stuff though.
Somewhat okay may be a bit of a generous statement. Before netbooks disappeared, that was their last domain where they made anything worthwhile. The only thing Acer makes that is any good now is monitors. Acer is the number one selling monitor in the country. But yup, all consumer computing gear.
No, the Acer Ultrabooks are great quality. The Netbooks not so much.
Their netbooks were good, some of the best on the market at the time. Their tablets weren't bad but I wasn't ever real impressed with their Ultrabooks. They're alright but nothing great.
