PRINT.IT
19
MPS
This year, HP combined its premier
partner/customer event and
industry analyst/press briefing
into a single HP Discover event
in Las Vegas – fittingly, perhaps,
as this will be the last time that
HP meets the world in its present
form, as a single company.
This was a truly huge event, with
over 10,000 attendees. Yet the
organisation appeared flawless, and
presentations and meetings ran
like clockwork, all in the massive
indoor bubble of the Venetian/
Palazzo complex in Las Vegas,
with its miles of corridors, meeting
facilities, restaurants, casinos and
shops, complete with a recreation
of Venice with artificial lagoon and
sky. There was no need to venture
outside throughout the four days of
the event, and one was left with the
impression that this is what life might
be like in a colony on the surface
of Mars.
HP CEO Meg Whitman explained
the thinking behind HP’s separation
into two companies, principally the
desire to create more focus and
agility, and confirmed the timetable
for the split, with HP Enterprise
and HP Inc. due to start operating
separately from August 1, prior to
legal separation from the start of
the new fiscal year on November
1. Together, she and Dion Weisler,
Executive Vice President of Printing
& Personal Systems (PPS), set
out the vision, strategy and senior
management structures of the two
new companies.
Split personalities
Hewlett Packard Enterprise will have
a new identity and green logo, and
will focus on the ‘New Style of IT’ for
the Idea Economy – with four themes:
n
Transforming to a Hybrid
Infrastructure;
n
Protecting the Digital Enterprise;
n
Empowering a data-driven
organisation; and
n
Enabling workplace productivity.
HP Inc. will retain the blue HP
logo and identity, reflecting the need
to leverage the brand heritage for
its consumer business, and a focus
on the workspace, rather than back
office infrastructure.
The process involved in separating
into two companies has of course
been complex, and HP appears
to have gone about it with all the
thoroughness one would expect,
given its engineering heritage.
Although the two new companies
will operate as separate entities, it
has been recognised up-front that
they will still have many partners
and customers in common, and
that the Channel will play a key
role delivering the synergy to keep
these together. There will be a joint
programme for partners who work
with both companies, run somewhat
along the lines of the major airline
alliances, with partners earning
points according to their level of co-
operation with each company.
Sense of excitement
Going into this event, one might
have thought the logic behind HP’s
split was to position Hewlett Packard
Enterprise as an exciting new service-
led business driving future growth,
and HP Inc. as the duller hardware
business, to be hived off with lower
growth prospects. However, that
would be grossly unfair to the HP
Inc. management team, led by Dion
Weisler, who created a real sense
of excitement and commitment to
future growth potential. Interestingly,
given all the indications that the
PPS Division was being led mainly
by people with a PC rather than a
printer background, the main focus
of future growth potential identified
at this event appeared to be in the
print business.
Against the general market view
that print is in decline, HP believes
it can generate increased revenue
by targeting ‘pockets of growth’,
leveraging its brand strength and
being selective about where it plays.
Thus, although home printing
volumes are declining, HP believes it
can achieve growth by reinvigorating
the market with a combination of:
n
Innovative new products, including
new form factors that make printers
more acceptable throughout the
home;
n
A truly easy-to-use mobile printing
solution, to address the demand
for printing on the go from mobile
media; and
n
New services, such as Instant
Ink, which has been very successful
in the markets where it has been
introduced, showing extremely high
customer retention levels.
Superior economics
In business printing, HP believes
there is still some market growth,
but they are targeting what they
have identified as specific pockets of
opportunity.
The first is a challenge they have
publicly set themselves to achieve a
market share in A3 printers (where
HP’s presence is currently almost
negligible) comparable to the
dominant position that they have
in A4 printers. To achieve this, HP
Steven Swift, co-founder of IDeAs, a European network of consultants specialising
in MPS, attended the HP Discover customer event in Las Vegas where he learnt all
about the company’s vision for the future of print
Together for the last time
Continued...
Meg Whitman, CEO, HP
Pockets of
growth:
HP Instant Ink
