InfoTech: HP tosses consumers on bonfire of its vanity

HP is spending approx USD10,000 million on Autonomy which has plugged away under the radar (mainly because it's British so US reporters don't notice it) for many for many years but has built up an excellent portfolio of products and customers.

There are an estimated quarter of a million TouchPads in the hands of retailers in the USA. With HP deciding to abandon the project, they have the option of sending them back for a credit or taking a cash-credit from HP to allow them to dump the stock at below recommended price.

HO has looked long and hard at its business and decided what needs support, what needs to be tossed and what can be sold off. CEO Leo Apotheker recognises that it's hard medicine " "the tablet effect is real and sales of the TouchPad are not meeting [HP's] expectations."

Decoded: tablets are eating into our laptop sales, laptops are eating into desktop sales and our tablet isn't getting enough market share. Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 is estimated to have sold a quarter of a million units in the UK in the few days it was on sale before a German court ordered it to be taken off the market across most of the EU.

The PC division of HP is not making a loss: but for some making a profit of more than USD550 million in the last quarter is not enough. or HP sees the signs on the wall and want to sell it while it still has value. That is, after all, how it came by Compaq. But Lenovo has turned IBM's PC and laptop business around.

But it is the TouchPad that has disappointed most at HP: launched just seven weeks ago in the US, within a couple of weeks, the price was cut by USD100. Still sales did not pick up. Part of the problem may be that the tablet market is dominated by Apple's iPad and Android devices. The WebOS interface looks just a little bit too like Windows and, although Windows tablets are around, they are floundering. And unless the HP tablet can have access to the wide range of Apps that turn iOS and Android into winners, then the device is moribund.

In June, Microsoft ditched its KIN line of mobile phones with their dedicated operating system called, simply, OS. It had run for less than seven weeks in the USA, via Verizon, and never made it to export markets. Microsoft said ""We have made the decision to focus exclusively on Windows Phone 7 and we will not ship KIN in Europe this fall as planned. Additionally, we are integrating our KIN team with the Windows Phone 7 team, incorporating valuable ideas and technologies from KIN into future Windows Phone releases. We will continue to work with Verizon in the U.S. to sell current KIN phones."

But, clearly, no intention to provide long term support (KINda like old versions of Windows, then).

Perhaps some companies have high expectations - or don't realise that sometimes it is better to follow than to lead.