Tuesday, November 16, 1999
Hewlett-Packard vision: Nothin' but Net
Internet products to be primary focus
BY CLIFF EDWARDS
The Associated Press
LAS VEGAS — Hewlett-Packard Co. chief executive Carly Fiorina on Monday unveiled her vision for transforming the company from a product-driven colossus to a pioneer of Internet services and ideas, a change that will be highlighted by a $200 million marketing campaign.
Ms. Fiorina, a former Lucent Technologies executive hired in July with the goal of reinvigorating the 60-year-old company, told attendees at the giant annual Comdex fall computer show that the Palo Alto, Calif.-based giant will return to its roots — that of being an inven- tor and innovator.
“We will be preserving the best and reinventing the rest,” she said. “This is a company founded by two men who are pretty radical thinkers. Somehow, along the way, we stopped talking about invention. We're going to start talking about it again.”
The company unveiled a marketing campaign emphasizing the Palo Alto garage in which founders Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard turned out their first product, an electronic instrument used to test sound. Its
new logo will be “HP: Invent.”
Ms. Fiorina also showed highlights of some of the products that HP engineers have been working to bring to market in coming months, mostly devices aimed at connecting to the Internet without being bound to a personal computer.
Among the intriguing possibilities: a venture with Swatch to develop a wristwatch that could access the Web. Ms. Fiorina would not provide additional details of the timing of such a product or its potential cost, however.
Most consumers know Hewlett-Packard only for its printers and computers. It also has been slow to embrace the Internet, a fact that has turned Wall Street investors away.
But Ms. Fiorina said she is working to quickly transform the company into one that offers not only appliances, but infrastructure such as secure computer servers and Internet services.
“The challenge for all of us is to think hard about how to make money from e-services,” she said.
Hewlett-Packard has been aggressively partnering with other companies in a bid to catch up to a slew of competitors working to make consumer acceptance of the Internet easier, with the idea that early name recognition will result in ultimate victory. At the same time, however, it faces intense competition in its core product categories, including printers and computer servers.
Hewlett-Packard's stock has fallen sharply in recent weeks after the company warned its fourth-quarter earnings, which are due this week, would be lower than Wall Street expectations because of chip production problems resulting from theearthquake in Taiwan. Analysts expect it to earn 70 cents to 73 cents a share.
The company's stock was down $2.061/4, to $74.621/2, at Monday's close on the New York Stock Exchange.
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Hewlett-Packard vision: Nothin' but Net
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