UPDATED: HP board cans CEO Apotheker for Meg Whitman

[Scarpozzi]

I agree lxskllr. I have a Touchpad and I have an iPhone, and from a pure OS perspective, I much prefer webOS. I just want to see the app base grow significantly and IMO, HP should've sold the tablets for less and tried to make the money in the app store.

I agree, but they have supply chain issues from the top down. To even enter the tablet market, they should have done more to sell direct to the consumers. The backlash came from the stock sitting in Best Buy's warehouse when they chose to release a new product in the summer. It should have been dropped on everyone in the end of Q3, not the beginning of beginning of Q3.

It meant that when best buy wanted to return most of their Touchpads, the costs to HP would have been pretty severe. I just wonder if HP encouraged BB to take so many units or if it was just an oversight by BB basing the tablet's success on iPad numbers.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

It keeps getting better:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-...naware-of-plan-to-replace-him.html?cmpid=yhoo

 

[manly]

It keeps getting better:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-...naware-of-plan-to-replace-him.html?cmpid=yhoo

Doubt Caesar knew he was taking Rome's early retirement program either.

lxskllr, they still make calculators. They just don't pour any R&D into them anymore, but that's understandable. But still a small sign this hasn't been Bill & Dave's HP for a long time.

 

[IHateMyJob2004]

Good, at least she knows how to run a business.

Phttthattt ... coffee spitso out of mouth.

When I read the headline I though "her"? I am ready to short HP on this news alone.

 

[preslove]

In Leo's defense (and believe me, I think he is an idiot), the board approved the major things he did. I think they're looking for a scapegoat when in fact, many of those board members need to be canned as well.

8 of the 14 members of the board have only been there since 2010. http://h30261.www3.hp.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=71087&p=irol-govboard

Corporate governance in america is a fucking joke because CEOs just stuff their boards with their friends. This makes this coup all the more surprising.

 

[zinfamous]

well, she does need a job, and she did spend all of her money on one massively hilarious fuck-up.

she'd be perfect!

 

[spidey07]

Deal's done. Whitman is CEO.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/h-p-names-meg-whitman-as-ceo-2011-09-22?reflink=MW_news_stmp

 

[abaez]

Huh?

Whitman took eBay from a company with 30 employees and revenues of $4 million and turned it into a company with 15,000 employees and revenues of ~$8 billion.

If you consider a CEO who increased revenues 199,900% then I guess Meg Whitman is a fuck up.

ANY CEO could have done that. eBay was a major site that was there from the start and just rode the internet boom. There was no other online auction option for anyone.

Of course she left once the growth subsided and eBay started having troubles, so she has never really dealt with any sort of adversity.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

8 of the 14 members of the board have only been there since 2010. http://h30261.www3.hp.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=71087&p=irol-govboard

Corporate governance in america is a fucking joke because CEOs just stuff their boards with their friends. This makes this coup all the more surprising.

And IIRC, 6 of those were people he appointed and he was criticized by some ethics watchdog of cronyism.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Well, here's her chance to prove she just wasn't in the right place at the right time with her success at eBay. With the idiots on their BoD though, I don't have much confidence that they'd stop her if she did something stupid (see: Leo).

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Poor Leo, his golden parachute is only worth $25 million:

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/22/tec...severance/index.htm?source=cnn_bin&hpt=hp_bn5

HP's next move should be to fire every single director who was responsible for hiring him in the first place. Seriously, has there ever been a more incompetent BoD and CEO?

 

[manly]

Poor Leo, his golden parachute is only worth $25 million:

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/22/tec...severance/index.htm?source=cnn_bin&hpt=hp_bn5

HP's next move should be to fire every single director who was responsible for hiring him in the first place. Seriously, has there ever been a more incompetent BoD and CEO?

Yahoo did turn down Microsoft's $30+ billion offer a few years ago.

With some effort, I'm sure you could come up with a lot of examples.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Yahoo did turn down Microsoft's $30+ billion offer a few years ago.

With some effort, I'm sure you could come up with a lot of examples.

The board had never met Leo and hired him and weren't even aware of why he left (or was forced out) at SAP. The excuse given was "we were just sick and tired of fighting" as a reason why they didn't perform more due diligence. What do you think they would do if their employees didn't do any work and just said "We were just too tired of messing with it and just took the easy way out?"

 

[lxskllr]

Yahoo did turn down Microsoft's $30+ billion offer a few years ago.

With some effort, I'm sure you could come up with a lot of examples.

A lot of the examples will be strategic errors though. Not something like HP which leaves even a dummy like me asking WTF are they doing?!

 

[IndyColtsFan]

A lot of the examples will be strategic errors though. Not something like HP which leaves even a dummy like me asking WTF are they doing?!

That's right. You can point to lots of CEOs and BoDs who drove their companies into the ground with strategic errors, some of which were obviously questionable when they made them. But HP? Read the article I posted earlier regarding the board's extreme dereliction of duty and lack of due diligence when hiring him. And even before him, the board was awful and was involved in one fiasco after another.

Seriously, what if you were hired as a CEO and didn't feel like putting in any effort and when questioned by the board, said "Well I was just tired of fighting with my staff and took the easy way out." What do you think the board's reaction would be? They'd fire you in a heartbeat. Well, most boards would at least -- at HP, you'd probably get a new contract.

 

[manly]

The board had never met Leo and hired him and weren't even aware of why he left (or was forced out) at SAP. The excuse given was "we were just sick and tired of fighting" as a reason why they didn't perform more due diligence. What do you think they would do if their employees didn't do any work and just said "We were just too tired of messing with it and just took the easy way out?"

you're right, a predecessor of this board was caught snooping on itself and the press in an attempt to control leaks. Not to mention hiring Carly and then ignoring Hewlett's strenuous public objection to the Compaq acquisition.

Maybe HP overpaid for Autonomy, but I can't disagree with spinning off the PC business. It generates huge revenues, but tiny profits. Clearly he was hoping to copycat IBM, and SAP to a degree. I don't know enough to say he ran HP into the ground, but short of some major legal liability they shouldn't have jettisoned Mark Hurd over some inaccurate expense reports.

 

[thegimp03]

Wow, that was quick, but deserved.

 

[SunnyD]

Seriously? Is he that deluded?

Apotheker Said to Have Been Unaware of Ouster

By Aaron Ricadela - Sep 22, 2011 3:23 PM CT

Hewlett-Packard Co. Chief Executive Officer Leo Apotheker, who is expected to be fired today, was unaware that his standing as CEO was being questioned until the news broke yesterday, according a person close to the situation.

Apotheker was preparing to discuss strategy at today’s board meeting, said the person, who asked not to be named because the matter is private. Instead, the directors replaced him with former EBay Inc. (EBAY) CEO Meg Whitman, who is on the board.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

And the LULZ keep coming:

“It has got to be the worst board in the history of business,” Tom Perkins, a former H.P. director and a Silicon Valley legend, told me.

During Mr. Apotheker’s brief tenure, once-proud H.P. has become a laughingstock in Silicon Valley.

Leo Apotheker is the worst CEO hire in the last decade.

I remember when he was hired -- I IMed my friend at HP and he even seemed shocked at the move and he is an ardent defender of HP.

 

[waggy]

what a amazing story. not just of Leo but HP's issues the last few years.

but man what a way to ruin a business in a year..

 

[spidey07]

what a amazing story. not just of Leo but HP's issues the last few years.

but man what a way to ruin a business in a year..

HP is going to lose server market share big time because of Cisco's UCS. It's already being gobbled up. Their blade enclosures are too old and management is a complete pain. Almost like they have different divisions for the various parts and management and nothing is integrated.

 

[Kadarin]

"Is HP's Board the Worst Ever?"

http://money.cnn.com/2011/09/22/technology/hp_board/index.htm?hpt=hp_c2

Sad.

 

[sdifox]

Leo was not the worst. Fiorina killed HP and Compaq with one move. Double fatality.

 

[darkxshade]

All of this started with a woman... I'm telling ya... bitches be crazy.

 

[drebo]

So does this mean that HP won't be selling its PC division afterall?

I fucking hope not. I like the HP Business Desktops and the Elitebooks are effing awesome.