When Meg Whitman was appointed CEO, a couple of years ago, to turn around an ailing Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ), the writing was on the wall that soon or later the elephantine-size of the organization would work against it. Not denying Whitman’s attempts at keeping it together, it ‘now’ appears to be strategically correct for the company to separate its multiple-businesses sectors.
On Monday, Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ) announced that it will split by the end of 2015, into two smaller entities. The enterprises division of the business will continue to be headed by Whitman, comprising its computing and networking businesses; while an agile and enthusiastic division, HP Inc., would be headed by Dion Weisler. The latter will include the Printing and PC businesses divisions of the company. The split was not a surprise, according to industry analysts.
Whitman retains many of the long-term players at the company, and continues to serve the Enterprise. This includes, Cathie Lesjak, as the CFO of the new company, while Henry Gomez will continue in the role of Chief Marketing as well as Communications Officer.
All eyes are on John Hinshaw, who has affected noticeable operational changes in the work processes at HPQ. An ex-Boeing executive Hinshaw has revamped HPQs legacy service processes as well as business processes. The most interesting changes during his tenure have been the partnership with Salesforce.com.
The split has not made changes to many of the core areas of operations of Hewlett-Packard. This includes Martin Fink continuing his tenure as CTO of the HP Lab’s, thereby not disturbing the current research and development operations.
Currently HP Inc. does not have many of the Enterprises’ senior players to assist Weisler, who awaits the appointment of a CFO, CMO and General Counsel for his unit. Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ) will run its PC division under a new name of personal systems, which will continue to be run by Ron Coughlin, the current head of the PC division.
