H-P’s malaise signals a wrong turn in the Valley

Market Watch ^ | August 10,2012 | JOHN DVORAK'S

[Hojczyk]

Hewlett-Packard Co. appears to be at a point of no return. Either Meg Whitman fixes everything wrong with the company or we may see the end of H-P.

Thus we are about to witness the greatest comeback in history, which will set Whitman up as one of the greatest chief executives ever, or we’ll witness the incomprehensible.

The incomprehensible is the end of the progenitor of the entire Silicon Valley mythos. This is THE company that began in a garage and allowed other companies to begin in a garage, all in the Palo Alto- Menlo Park area.

Yes, like a monument to abject failure, Solyndra stands out on the road. All part of a dead love affair with all things green.

This is what happened to suck the energy out of Silicon Valley. Elsewhere most of the world’s lesser venture capitalists were throwing their funds into MEMs (micro-electrical-mechanical systems). The Silicon Valley boys were going after trendy “green” inventions.

Billions of dollars that could have been used to create the next generation of integrated circuits or a unique new real technology invention instead went into green dead-ends. This includes batteries and battery cars as well as solar with ideas such as Solyndra.

When the Chinese came in with older solar technology that was simply cheaper, none of our new ideas could compete, if they ever could. It was over instantly.

The green thing began with Obama and the emergence of numerous green funds, many looking for government handouts. The ludicrous appearance of Al Gore as a venture capitalist working with Kleiner, Perkins highlights the errors.

After witnessing what has happened in the last few years, especially with H-P, I do not have high hopes.

[HamiltonJay]

Carly put H-P on death watch, they still haven’t recovered from that disaster. Hopefully they can, but when you decide R&D is not important and you are a technology innovation company, you pretty much ensure your death.

Carly and those that followed turned HP from an innovation company into nothing but a commodity company, and you only make about 7% if that on commodity products.

Its a damned shame what has been done to HP

[roylene]

Yep. The GOP is California is a joke.
In primaries they will go whole hog in support of liberals running against conservatives because they say they wont win.
As a voter why on earth would you vote for a liberal Republican when there is a liberal democrat already in office.
As far as HP goes, I am glad my husband isn’t there any longer.
Fortunately he hooked up with guys he worked with for over 20 years as they are working on a start up, he says its just like the early days of HP.

[NVDave]

I’m happy to hear that he’s doing a startup with good people.

The one downside to startups at our age is that we can’t put in the 20-hour-days week after week.

The upside to startups at our age is that we’re oh-so-much smarter about the money side of the game than we were as young engineers, and we’re not as likely to be taken to the cleaners by VC’s or angels.

At some point, engineers oughta get together and write a book about “HP - what we lost” about what HP was like and how influential it was to American EE’s in the 60’s through 90’s and what we lost when Fiorina was allowed to wreck the institution. It would be of some benefit to put this out there so that political hacks like Fiorina are given the black eyes they so richly deserve.

[roylene]

Brilliant.
It would be a best seller.
Have a nice day.