The company made these statements ahead of its third-quarter earnings report, which hinted at a possible rationale behind the move: HP PSG remains the PC market leader, but revenues fell by three percent and profits were the lowest among the company's other divisions at 5.9 percent.
HP spent US$1.2 billion to acquire Palm and webOS last April and even in March this year, CEO Leo Apotheker was talking up a future with webOS installed on every one of its PC. These plans seemed to have fallen by the wayside since the tepid reception that greeted its webOS products.
The TouchPad, which received mixed reviews, was recently discounted and following this announcement, its future looks bleak. HP has said that it is looking to "explore options to optimize the value of WebOS software going forward", which could mean the company is open to licensing it. HP could even find a buyer for webOS, especially if there are useful patents in its intellectual portfolio. And if nothing works out, we hope that the company will consider the open-source route. We have contacted HP regarding its plans for consumers who have bought the TouchPad, but the company has declined to comment at the moment.
As part of its restructuring to focus on enterprise software services, HP is also buying a British software company, Autonomy for US$10 billion. Whether that is enough to bootstrap the company into this higher-margin segment and compete with the likes of IBM and Oracle remains to be seen.
HP spent US$1.2 billion to acquire Palm and webOS last April and even in March this year, CEO Leo Apotheker was talking up a future with webOS installed on every one of its PC. These plans seemed to have fallen by the wayside since the tepid reception that greeted its webOS products.
The TouchPad, which received mixed reviews, was recently discounted and following this announcement, its future looks bleak. HP has said that it is looking to "explore options to optimize the value of WebOS software going forward", which could mean the company is open to licensing it. HP could even find a buyer for webOS, especially if there are useful patents in its intellectual portfolio. And if nothing works out, we hope that the company will consider the open-source route. We have contacted HP regarding its plans for consumers who have bought the TouchPad, but the company has declined to comment at the moment.
As part of its restructuring to focus on enterprise software services, HP is also buying a British software company, Autonomy for US$10 billion. Whether that is enough to bootstrap the company into this higher-margin segment and compete with the likes of IBM and Oracle remains to be seen.
Posts
