There are certainly people more wise and informed about such things as
stock prices, earnings and dividends, but I have with someone who does know
more than I do and he responded something like this:

HP announced a 6 cent earning but declared an 8 cent dividend; it won't
take long to get into trouble if this continues. Every time a company does
something like this, it is spending up its future earnings. Hewlett Packard
used to be known for its advanced scientific equipment and hardware. Now it
is trying to sell services. HP probably can't continue to rely on printers
(about 75% of its business or so) to be profitable. Carly left Lucent just
before the company experienced what HP is going through right now.

My concern for some time is that the President / CEO / Chairman of HP
doesn't seem to be paying any attention to the computer side of the house
where it made its money in the first place just two decades ago.

That she would rather go to the Gartner Group ITxpo instead of HP World
seems to send some kind of signal which is not good from the client's point
of view.

I'd like to think he was wrong, but a former Director I had once said that
getting a Hewlett Packard HP3000 was like getting a Packard automobile.

Unfortunately, the actions of recent months by HP has convinced the
Directors here that it is NOT in the best interest to continue on the
HP3000, and in the long run, the best answer for them seems to be to
migrate from MPE to another platform over the next three years.

HP had equipment which was of especially high quality and unique to fill a
niche market.

Selling PCs these days is not a niche market, and neither is selling
printers [although I would never part with my Color LaserJet 4550!].

It may be true that turning HP around is like turning around the Queen Mary-
-slow and chewing up lots of resources; however, the visualization of
turning around HP as one would the Queen Mary is quite disturbing,
especially if you picture it just about to go over Niagra Falls.

One does not find very much comfort looking down into the future of HP for
the "foreseeable future".

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