back to article Meg Whitman OUT at HP ...Inc

Meg Whitman has cut her last ties with HP Inc by stepping down as chairwoman of the company's board of directors. Whitman, who will still be the CEO of the split-off Hewlett Packard Enterprise, said that effective immediately she would be leaving her role and handing control of the board over to Chip Bergh. Prior to the 2015 …

  1. This post has been deleted by its author

  2. sanmigueelbeer
    Happy

    It has started

    (Big) Rat leaving a sinking ship?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Big Rat?

      nope. I think her job is done. She has decapitated the company and made it a mere shell of what it was. She will go to UBER with a few tens of millions in the bank. I think that both HP and DCX will cease to exist within 3-4 years. As someone who worked for them for 20+ years I find it very sad that her raping of the company has been left to go on for so long.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Big Rat?

        Agreed. This isn't about the money though; as a billionaire another few million won't change her life. Life HAS changed though for the tens of thousands she has made redundant.

        Lest we forget, in 2012 she said she would turn around HP (all of it) and have it growing by 2016. Sometime in 2014 she realised it wasn't going to happen and decided to sell off the family silver. I too can see the HP name disappearing in a few years. Shame.

  3. DCFusor
    Meh

    Maybe she'll do for Uber

    And wreck it the rest of the way, like HP.

    I remember a time when HP test gear was comparable to tektronix. And a time they made great B/W lastr printers...now?

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Maybe she'll do for Uber

      "I remember a time when HP test gear was comparable to tektronix."

      That sells HP short. HP of old made a lot more than test gear. I don't recall Tektronix making spectrophotometers, for instance.

      All of which goes to show that the wrecking of HP was even worse than you thought.

      1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

        Re: Maybe she'll do for Uber @DCFusor

        I understand that you can still buy the evolutions of that test gear, but you have to get it from Keysight, which is the a spin off of Agilent, which was the former test and measurement division of HP.

        1. short

          Re: Maybe she'll do for Uber @DCFusor

          Maybe Keysight will ditch the daft name and logo, and start making HP gear again. You know, the (mostly) good stuff they used to. Among test gear people at least, the HP name carries a lot of fondness.

          Agilent / Genital was a crazy rebranding, but maybe it made sense to try to decouple from the systems borg HP was turning into?

          1. DCFusor

            Re: Maybe she'll do for Uber @DCFusor

            I was of course speaking of the stuff I personally used as an EE. Spectrophotomerters were kinda so expensive that one of my customers commissioned us to automate a manual one for him.

            At any rate, no need to overpay these days for the things I use. My packrat ways and inheritance have me fully stocked with old Tek, HP, and GR gear for the stuff that things of that vintage will do (like a signal generator that puts out WATTS and pretty much can't be fried). And so on. Perhaps a ton or two of that kinda gear.

            Perhaps sadly, once I got used to the foibles of digital scopes, it's been all chinese for me. I write PC (linux) code to control those and use them for monitoring and data acquisition in my science work.

  4. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

    Well, if you read "out" in the meaning of "unpopular" she's been out at HP for quite a while now.

    BTW, what is Carly Fiorina doing these days?

    1. Colin Bull 1
      Devil

      BTW, what is Carly Fiorina doing these days?

      she does not have to work after the bungs she got for ditching DEC/Alpha for Intel - sorry meant for Compaq.

    2. MyffyW Silver badge

      OUT

      I didn't read anything other than "given her marching orders" until your subtitle El Reg whereupon I felt compelled to look for some insinuation disguised as journalism and was all ready to welcome her to the cause.

      Still you got me to read the article - sort of - so job done.

  5. David Roberts

    Always remember this was not HP.

    HP was a skilled and ethical engineering company, enormously respected throughout the industry.

    The "HP" of recent years was just a massive Borg of all sorts of once great companies including EDS which at the end was itself another massive Borg of once great companies.

  6. one crazy media

    Whitman is one trick pony.

    Don't why people give these one trick pony's CEO jobs to screw up companies. Running Pay Pal and running innovative technology company is very different.

    1. Dave Harvey
      Mushroom

      PayPal => Innovation

      I can think of one guy who has managed that route pretty well!

      But MW is no EM.....

    2. ToddRundgrensUtopia

      I think you mean ebay

  7. Redstone
    Unhappy

    The real problem here

    ...IMHO is the market expectation that mature compaies will continue to grow at the same rate as saplings.

    The only way to create this 'growth' is by buying up other companies in the same general market as you and continually restructure your debt to keep the process ongoing. Not a receipe for technical innovation when all the 'excess' staff are being trimmed from the industry.

    Too many CEOs today have no vision for their company other than who they might buy to satiate the shareholder's growth expectations. I can't see this ending well for the last big fish in the pond - where does the Ponzi growth come from then?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The real problem here

      Unrealistic expectations for growth, seen that before...

      An industrial test equipment firm I worked for was acquired by GE, and the edict came down from On High (they were high on something, fer sure) that every department must commit to double-digit revenue growth, year-on-year. My department made stuff on government contract, and there was obviously no way to grow THAT market in this way, but GE management insisted on that stupid crap anyway. Of course, even in a purely commercial market, that expectation was serious carpet-chewing madness.

      The thin air at high management levels is clearly leading to chronic hypoxia and drain bamage in corporate execs.

      Anon for obvious reasons, and Trump.

      1. Fatman

        Re: The real problem here

        <quote>The thin air at high management levels is clearly leading to chronic hypoxia and drain bamage in corporate execs.</quote>

        That is indeed the problem. The atmosphere is so dammed thin at an altitude of 50 miles. (aka "Head In The Clouds" syndrome.)

    2. Down not across

      Re: The real problem here

      ...IMHO is the market expectation that mature compaies will continue to grow at the same rate as saplings.

      That's corporate greed for you. And as another commentard pointed out, the only realistic way to achieve that is by aggressive acquisitions.

      There was a time when companies were fairly happy when they were enough in the black that they could invest some back into the business with some leftover for dividends. As long as the bottom line was black, employees enjoyed fairly reasonable job security unlike today when even when companies are making profits and growin, heads must roll to reduce cost and produce better numbers for the Street.

      1. DCFusor

        Re: The real problem here

        To add - organic growth within a company and business area used to be possible. With the world economy as it is...the pie just isn't growing, so the only option for showing "growth" is to buy other companies, hopefully fire the deadwood, keep the customer list, and go from there. You can't grow the pie, so you try to steal a bigger slice.

        To bad it rarely actually works...

        What part of "everyone is broke" don't people understand? OK, a few aren't (including me) - but i my case I'm not buying much as I already "have it all", or pretty close.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "In recent days, reports surfaced that Whitman was being considered for the CEO role at Uber."

    RIP Uber.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "In recent days, reports surfaced that Whitman was being considered for the CEO role at Uber."

      Why? She's perfect for a company whose business is to screw up workers and customers alike.

      I guess she will introduce the idea Uber drivers can only refill using Uber consumables....

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    HPE v HP

    Disclaimer - I work for HPE.

    Can't really comment on HP that much as I only worked for the OG HP for a couple of years and agree that is was huge, fat and slow and I for one was happy to see the split. I'm not so sure I agree with the opinion that HPE is "dead". I'm not trying to do a cheerleader session here (God knows I have my share of complaints with this company). I carry a bag on a national and international scale for HPE and I can tell you were are winning. Something has really changed in the market. It seems customers are getting sick and tired of building and maintaining DCs based on components (ie seperate storage, compute and networking). And to compete in that space was brutal. Years ago I couldn't even get a customer to spit on me. Now, they are pulling on us to "show me what you got" and we are winning our fair share of those, especially with composable. Will it be enough, fast enough? Time will tell but I like our odds...

    1. Jbry

      Re: HPE v HP

      HPE is losing market share in pretty much every category according to all the big data analysts...not sure where exactly they're winning? I mean the market is certainly getting better all around, and I suspect business "feels" good for a lot of companies, but to say HPE is winning on a global scale flies in the face of all the data out there. Perhaps you're just a great rep and winning in your accounts?

  10. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

    Uber moving into rides in articulated lorries

    Does this mean that Uber will be ditching cars and fullfilling services using HGV's

    You may recall that HP were masters of overpackaging. Who can forget*:-

    https://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/12/22/hp_box/

    *(complete with Playmobil and prescient mention of überbox)

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