Mark Kolier’s Blog

Posts Tagged ‘H-P’

Every year in January the CES takes place in Las Vegas. This year there is buzz about tablet PCs (more than 50 will be on display), television apps, 3D TV apps and accessories, computer printers (HP apparently has a really cool one coming out), and new payment cards just to name a few. If you want to read a longer article on what’s in store CNET has a nice one – http://bit.ly/gKs0aY. Consumer Reports has a short video that does a nice job of previewing what will be introduced beginning today – http://bit.ly/gMXZ2W

I’ve never been to the CES although I have been to Vegas more than a dozen times (most of those times were before I was 22) but only once was business a part of the program. Las Vegas in January is far from any kind of tropical destination with temperatures in the 50’s during the day and 30’s at night. But hey – it’s Vegas baby right?

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has made the CES into a platform for unleashing new products. This year is likely to be no different. Ironically the keynote speech is to be made by Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer. Last year 126,000 people attended the 2010 CES – the number of attendees is poised to increase to 140,000 this year. I can only imagine what it must be like to try to get a room in Las Vegas which still is coming back from the devastating 2008 recession.

Americans and citizens of the world are continuing their love affair with technology. The CES plays right into that as it often sets the tone for what will be the hot tech products of the year. There are some (intentionally) badly kept secrets regarding releases of new products (i.e. Verizon’s iPhone), but also hopefully a few surprise announcements that will be intriguing.

I will have Bloomberg TV’s feed on for the next few days in the hope of catching news as it happens and hopefully to get a better sense of the overall atmosphere. And yes I am seriously thinking about attending the 2012 CES show just to do it one time. After all – hey it’s Vegas baby!

Are you going to the CES this year and if you are not, why not and would you like to?

The news came blaring across this past Friday afternoon. Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd had abruptly resigned (or had been asked to resign more properly). This occurred after it was revealed that Mr. Hurd had not disclosed a ‘close personal relationship’ with an H-P contractor Jodie Fisher.

Both Mr. Hurd and Ms. Fisher have denied that they had any kind of sexual relationship. As in the case with Tiger Woods and his wife, I say – who cares? What Mr. Hurd (or Mr. Woods) does with regard to his private life should not be any of our concern – but too often that is not the case. The real problem is that Mr. Hurd used $ 20,000 of H-P funds to pay some of Ms. Fisher’s expenses. And that Ms. Fisher was at times paid when there was no legitimate business purpose.

OK, wipe the smirk off your faces now.

Mr. Hurd offered to repay the money. But it was far too late. Just a note for the record – Mr. Hurd made $ 42.5 million in fiscal 2008 http://bit.ly/98dM2P. In 2009 the number was over $ 24 million. I think the real reason Mr. Hurd had to resign is that the directors at Hewlett-Packard were shocked to find out that they man had been anointed a corporate genius in rallying H-P back to prominence was actually not that bright after all.

Is there any reason you can think of to corporate expense $ 20,000 to a still attractive former B-movie actress who was hired as a ‘consultant’ when you made more than $ 60 million over the past two years?
That’s about the worst kind of judgment and were I an H-P shareholder I would have been frightened not to mention furious.

Another shooting star has fallen fast. Is it just me folks or are you also shocked at how smart people can be so dumb?