Good bye, Carly!

For a while, everyone was asking themselves about the HP's way. In end of January I wrote that Carly's fail is getting pretty obvious.

Sooner or later, it had to touch the Board and according to HP press release Carleton S. Fiorina was fired.

They put a picture with a word "Change" on their website


Analysts, stockholders, The (Wall) Street and others are already wondering if this means that possibility of breaking the company appart is the next step. One of the strongest Players urging for the big split is Steven Milunovich of Merrill Lynch (ML to HP: Time for a breakup).

This scenario is on the table - month after month. BusinessWeek's Ben Elgin is wondering if Anyone can save HP. As possible saviors we hear the names of Michael Capellas (former Compaq CEO) and even John Joyce, chief of IBM Global Services.

I agree with Ben: they'll need someone like Lou Gerstner, who "saved" IBM in the 90's, 'couse they're deep in shit, almost as IBM was in those dark 90's.

Separate i-B (ink-Business) from HP and we'll see what's left. As I wrote before, they'll have to regroup their troops (or what's left of them) and reposition themselves. Trying to conquer the Big ones (corporate market) and Small fishes (consumer market) at the same time obviously doesn't work. At least not for them. As some say, they are just loosing their focus.

BusinessWeek has a story called Where Fiorina went wrong - Walter Hewlett is probably a bit satisfied now - you know, that feeling when you can say to somebody:"I warned you." :-)


If interested, make sure you don't miss BW's The inside story of Carly's ouster!
"HEAVY BLOW. By November of 2004, HP's directors began holding periodic conference calls -- without Fiorina -- to discuss their CEO's performance. "


@ Carly: so long and enjoy your $21 mio+!

I admire her for being such a strong player in the "men's world" of IT. She certainly had some good ideas, but I'm pretty sure Compaq merger wasn't one of them. Let's wait and see what happens next - will there still be one or we'll get more "little" HP's.

e-business is the game. Play to win.

Well, a least now I can use this picture I found on web some time ago: