HP announces Q4 results - which are “Disappointing” Nov 22, 2011 11:11 by John Sollars

HP announces Q4 results – which are “Disappointing”

After a turbulent period which saw HP dithering over the sale of its PC division and the fire sale of its touchpad competitor to Apples iPad the figures were further hit by the $2.1bn the company paid for restructuring, mainly affecting its webOS business that powered the TouchPad. HP’s iPad rival was scrapped in August and the company said it would no longer support its Palm Pre line of smart phones as sales failed to take off.

All this combined with the sacking of Leo Apotheker as CEO and the appointment of Meg Whitman as the new CEO (the third CEO in less than three years) meant the the Computer services to hardware giants earnings dropped 91% as the troubled information technology company dealt with the fallout from its failed foray into tablet computers and the ousting of its chief executive and then the change of mind about maintaining its PC division after all.

Despite these disappointments HPs results exceeded Wall Streets rather modest expectations and shares in the company edged up 2.4% to $27.50 in extended trading, after shedding more than 4% to close at $26.86 on the New York stock exchange.

Revenue from the company’s services division grew 1.7%, while its enterprise servers, storage and networking segment notched a 4% revenue decline and sales in HP’s core PC business fell 1.6%. Notebook revenue fell 4.1%, while desktop revenue was up 0.5%. Revenue at the company’s cash cow printer unit dropped 10%.

Recently appointed chief executive Meg Whitman said 2012 was a “rebuilding year” for HP.
“We need to get back to the business fundamentals in fiscal 2012, including making prudent investments in the business and driving more consistent execution,” she said.