Hewlett-Packard selling off its PC division?!

[thewayne]

I really don't know what to make of this. They buy Compaq, who had bought DEC, they buy 3Com, they buy Palm, the sell off the test instrumentation division which was the core of HP, and now they're dumping the PC line. They apparently have decided that the Palm/WebOS direction was a total waste of time and they're abandoning it, so you might be able to find some really deals on HP tablets very soon, if you're willing to risk buying an orphan.

One thing that I'm unclear about is whether or not they're going to sell off their printer line. I think that would be almost suicidal considering the huge profits they make on ink refills.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/08/hp-webos-tablet-touchpad/

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903596904576516403053718850.html

http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/11/08/18/1948232/HP-Spinning-Off-WebOS-and-Exiting-Hardware-Business

Comments

[silveradept]

Nah. HP's probably just getting out of the spots where the company can't be guaranteed to make profits and quickly.

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

Problem is they're trying to reinvent themselves as a software/services line, and unless they pull some pretty amazing acquisitions, they don't have a history of it.

I'm seriously wondering if they'll be around in another decade, or if they'll be like Borland: "What ever happened to...."

[silveradept]

True. Finding the right balance between "stick to what you do well" and "find the next big thing so that you don't fade into obscurity" is always tough for companies.