HP’s Whitman says ‘no plans to break up the company’
Hewlett-Packard's CEO has dismissed persistent rumors that the company might break itself up in a move that could create more value for shareholders.
"We have no plans to break up the company. I feel quite strongly that we are better and stronger together," Whitman said on HP's quarterly earnings call Thursday, responding to a question from an analyst about the company's plans.
Rumors that HP might break itself up have persisted since former CEO Leo Apotheker said two years ago that HP might sell off its underperforming PC business. HP later replaced Apotheker and said it would keep the division.
One rationale for a break-up is that HP's shareholders would get more value if more profitable parts of the business, such as the printer and services divisions, are separated from other divisions. Read more...
Oracle discusses Taleo product plans, girds for new battle with SAP
Oracle moved quickly on Friday to lay out its plans for the HCM (human capital management) software market, a couple days after rival SAP did the same thing.
SAP and Oracle have each made significant acquisitions of cloud-based HCM vendors in the past few months, with SAP paying $3.4 billion for SuccessFactors and Oracle announcing plans to buy Taleo for $1.9 billion earlier this month.
While many companies have already invested in a core human-resources software system for areas like payroll and benefits management, Taleo will bring Oracle applications on the fringes of the HCM category, such as recruitment and employee onboarding, that can be sold into existing and new accounts. Taleo will also give Oracle increased relevance in the cloud software market as well as staff with hands-on experience running a SaaS (software-as-a-service) business. SAP is seen as getting similar benefits from SuccessFactors. Read more...
LinkedIn scoops up browser plugin Rapportive: ‘We fell in love’
LinkedIn has bought browser plugin outfit Rapportive for an undisclosed sum.
The two-year-old start-up told its users that its handling of their data was now covered by LinkedIn's privacy policy and terms of service.
"During our partnership with LinkedIn, we got to know them very well. We found a great overlap between our visions. We found a high-calibre and extremely driven team. We found, crucially, a 'members-first' company: everything that LinkedIn does is about making its members more successful," the company's CEO Rahul Vohra gushed. Read more...
Management, business issues weigh on HP
Hewlett-Packard continues to struggle with leadership and business changes, reporting on Monday that fourth-quarter net earnings dropped 91 percent over last year.
The news comes just as Meg Whitman, former eBay chief, takes the helm at HP, reversing some decisions made by her predecessor, Leo Apotheker. She recently announced plans to keep HP's struggling PC business, after Apotheker had made plans to sell it or spin it off.
Net earnings for HP in its fourth quarter were US$200 million, down from $2.5 billion in the same period last year. Diluted earnings per share were $0.12, down 89 percent from $1.10 in 2010.
Net revenue dropped 3 percent in the fourth quarter to $32.1 billion, from $33.3 billion in the fourth quarter a year ago. Read more...
HP to decide on PC spin-off plans by year end
Just over a month after Hewlett-Packard said it would sell or spin-off its PC business, new CEO Meg Whitman on Thursday said the company will decide on a proposal to spin-off the PC unit by the end of the year.
Under former CEO Leo Apotheker, HP in mid-August said it would explore the sale or spin-off of the Personal Systems Group (PSG) unit, which deals in PCs, smartphones and tablets. News agency Bloomberg earlier reported that HP was reconsidering a proposal to spin-off the PC unit, citing a source familiar with the company's plans.
Speaking on a conference call Thursday, Whitman said that a decision on the group's future would come sometime in the next three months. "With regard to the potential spin off of PSG, we're committed to doing the work right now to determine the best path forward and we expect the board to make a determination by the end of the calendar year if not sooner. This decision is solely based on the value to investors and value to customers," Whitman said. Read more...
IBM, NCSA abandon petascale supercomputer project
Citing unforeseen complexities and greater-than-anticipated costs, IBM and the University of Illinois' NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications) have abandoned plans to build a petaflop-speed supercomputer, the two organizations said Monday.
As of Aug. 6, IBM had terminated its four-year 2008 "Blue Waters" contract, estimated at about $208 million, to developed a supercomputer. IBM had been expected to deliver the first version of the system within the next year or so.
"The innovative technology that IBM ultimately developed was more complex and required significantly increased financial and technical support by IBM beyond its original expectations," the joint statement read. "NCSA and IBM worked closely on various proposals to retain IBM's participation in the project but could not come to a mutually agreed-on plan concerning the path forward." Read more...
What ‘awesome’ thing will Facebook launch Wednesday?
Last week, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that his company will be "launching something awesome" on Wednesday. Little additional information is available about what it could be, although we can take some educated guesses based on Facebook's priorities and plans.
Here's what we think we might hear from the social networking site when it announces its latest creation at 10 a.m. Pacific Time tomorrow at its Palo Alto, California headquarters.
Project Spartan
Developing for several different platforms at once is definitely an unenviable task for Facebook's coders. Thus the company has embarked on a new path dubbed "Project Spartan". Essentially it's a development platform that is based in HTML5, which is supported across several platforms. Read more...