• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

UPDATED: HP board cans CEO Apotheker for Meg Whitman

Page 3 - Seeking answers? Join the AnandTech community: where nearly half-a-million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.
IndyColtsFan said:
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.
Click to expand...
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 said:
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.
Click to expand...

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

she'd be perfect!
 
Patranus said:
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.
Click to expand...

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.
 
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).
 
manly said:
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.
Click to expand...

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?"
 
manly said:
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.
Click to expand...

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?!
 
lxskllr said:
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?!
Click to expand...

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.
 
IndyColtsFan said:
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?"
Click to expand...
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.
 
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.
Click to expand...
 
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.
Click to expand...

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

Leo Apotheker is the worst CEO hire in the last decade.
Click to expand...



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.
 
Last edited:
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..
 
waggy said:
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..
Click to expand...

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.
 
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.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top