HP's Shift On PCs Could Boost Acer, Dell and Lenovo

CWmike writes "With HP spinning off its PC business, rivals will be looking for a way to get a bigger piece of the hardware pie. HP's PC unit news, among other industry-rattling announcements, including pulling out of the tablet market and shuttering webOS, rocked the hardware industry since HP is by far the dominant maker in the world. So while HP decides what to do, rivals should be plotting their next move, say industry analysts. Who could benefit the most from any change-up in PC sales? The obvious suspects: Dell, which passed Acer in the second quarter of this year; and Acer is looking to make up some lost ground and could see HP's shake up as an opportunity. And don't forget Lenovo, which holds the third-largest market share. Despite the general downshift for PCs, Lenovo is riding some great momentum right now, reports Gartner. In the second quarter of 2011, the company saw 22.5% growth in its PC shipments." A related article ponders the fate of webOS, looking at a number of potential buyers as well as the unlikely possibility that HP will open source it.

Carley really fucked them

[gr8_phk]

Nuf said.

Re:I'm impressed.

[Anonymous Coward]

It is their largest segment of their business. The market punished them today for it. It just isnt growing as fast as other segments. They want to say 'oh yeah 10% growth yoy' They have been following the market for many things instead of leading the way.

Instead of reinventing what they make they just threw the largest segment of their business overboard.

When IBM did it, it was not exactly a huge segment of their business at that point.

They are betting on someone else's company saving them. Hence the 10 billion dollar buy.

They do not lead they follow... They have had a string of 'duds' in the consumer market. Instead of taking on Apple and Dell and Acer in making a better PC. They made mediocre/cheaper ones. After your laptop literally falls apart after a year or two people look for better. After gouging your customers for years with ink they look for better.

They want to move into cheap services. More power to em. Whoever ends up with HP/Compaq computers could really take it somewhere. But I suspect they will just margin drive it into the ground.

Re:I'm impressed.

[whiteboy86]

Yeah, erase all those years of RD, manufacturing know-how, engineering skills and general success in the PC scene. This is testament of utter executive disconnection, incompetence if not plain betrayal of the company, employees, HP's shareholders and loyal customers. Probably realising he can't compete with Steve Jobs, he cowardly axes the entire division so he doesn't need to personally deal with Apple's dominance and leadership.

Re:I'm impressed.

[gnasher719]

I guess HP didn't notice that it took Apple and Steve Jobs good ten years of hard work to get where they are now. HP thought they could achieve the same with a one time payment of $1.2bn.