By Brenon Daly
Since when does an army without having its leading common go within the assault? That method would appear to go in opposition to convention, but Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) has completed just that because dumping Mark Hurd for his foibles. The tech large has chased a pair of deals to valuations which are basically 2-3 occasions the prevailing industry numerous. HP’s recent bidding war over 3PAR (PAR) and the purchase of ArcSight (ARST) shows a level of aggressiveness that indicates to us that the drivers for the acquisitions may have been emotional as well as financial, at least to a small degree.
If we step back and look at the setting for both deals, we can’t help but conclude that HP announced the transactions at a time when it looked vulnerable. Its star CEO had dramatically crashed back to earth, while its board (however again) appeared to have bungled what looked like a fairly routine internal investigation. Statements by the company that it was ‘business as usual’ didn’t get much of a hearing on Wall Street. Shares that changed hands in the low $50s in April have been worth less than $40 for much of the past month. HP’s marketplace cap lingers below $100bn, despite the company ringing up sales of about $120bn.
At the risk of drifting too far into psychology, we wonder if the deals weren’t a bit of overcompensation. (Certainly,
Office Professional Plus, paying 11x trailing sales for 3PAR might be considered overcompensation, or at the least,
Windows 7 Product Key, ‘heavy compensation,
Office Home And Student Key,’ if you’ll forgive the pun.) If investors and others were going to view HP as weak or directionless while its corner office was empty, well,
Windows 7 Home Premium,
Cheap Office 2010 jhgjhg, HP could use its vast resources to counter with a signal to remind everyone that it was formidable, with or devoid of a fulltime CEO. Of course,
Office Standard, we’re just playing armchair psychologist here. But something beyond just straight numbers seemed to be at work in HP’s recent moves.