“Former eBay CEO Meg Whitman is poised to be named the new CEO of Hewlett-Packard later today after the markets are closed, said multiple sources close to the situation,” Kara Swisher reports for AllThingsD.
“The full board of HP, which is meeting today in Silicon Valley, has not officially voted on move and the situation could certainly change, sources said it is nearly a done deal,” Swisher reports. “While there has been much speculation that the well-known Silicon Valley exec would be only an interim CEO for the troubled tech giant, several sources with knowledge of the situation said that she will be taking over leadership on a long-term basis.”
Swisher reports, “At least that’s the plan — HP has had seven CEOs since 1999 and its current one, Léo Apotheker, has only been in the job for 11 months. He will be fired, of course, with a nice, big (and appalling, considering the 47 drop in HP stock in his tensure) severance package as a goodbye-on-your-way out.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: If she turns that dysfunctional mess around, we’ll nominate her President of Planet Earth.
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Former eBay CEO Meg Whitman being considered for HP CEO job to replace Apotheker, say sources – September 21, 2011
Meg Whitman, four others join HP Board – January 20, 2011
Wow! Too bad they lead Apothecker have his way for even those few months. Whitman has her job cutout for her. Yikes!
Honestly, I think she did a terrible job at eBay. She would have hurt a healthy HP. HP in its current state, she will kill.
Agreed.
I actually thought the decision Mr. Apotheker made w.r.t. dumping money-resource-credibility hemorrhaging WebOS and getting out of the PC business outright were bold and probably the right in the long term. His execution needed some work, i.e. not announcing PC death before able to sell out the division etc.
However, what’s done is done, but to dump him and his ideas like this seems even more rash. Particularly if they now try to do anything different (i.e. doing a 180 on WebOS and/or PC business strategy) might now be not only too late, but even backfire.
HP might do well to concentrate on where their core is/are, and not their history.
Stupid, since Apotheker saved HP from billions of dollar level losses that were initiated by the media/Wall Street dear Mark Hurd.
HP are letters in ‘hype’.
HP needed more than a ‘Apothecary’ to change crap to gold. Meg is too late.
Whoever will replace the current CEO should realize that the PC era is over !!!
Wow replacing a male turkey with a female turkey, you’ll get lots of baby turkeys for sure. HP, the turkey that tried to fly but came crashing back to the ground. Just in time for Thanksgiving I say.
the short and happy life of Francis Macomber
Gagme!
The HP board will reap what they sow with their revolving door strategy for CEO succession. The next CEO has to get it right or the company will have to make unholy cuts on the way to oblivion.
I wonder if this will also scuttle the UK Autonomy purchase, and blow up that whole “let’s be IBM” strategy?