August 23, 2003
 
Open Magazine - Your strategic guide to Open Source
http://www.open-mag.com/cgi-bin/opencgi/email/redirect.cgi?Open822

Featuring an openBench Labs review of an enterprise desktop 
distribution that’s bound to have knowledge workers crossing over to Linux. 
*******************************
*******************************
Dear valued Open magazine subscriber,
 
For those of you who are working with HP-UX, we're pleased to offer the 
latest issue of HP World News from Interex, an independent HP user 
group. The publication is a useful resource for upcoming training and 
conferences, and for keeping up with HP's portfolio of products and 
services. In this week's issue: HP to offer Altiris Local Recovery Pro on all 
HP Compaq business desktop and notebook PCs; SEC fines Deutsche Bank 
unit over actions in HP-Compaq deal; and more.

If you want to get your own free subscription to HP World News, just 
visit
http://www.interex.org

All the best,
 
Open magazine

*******************************
*******************************

H P   W O R L D   N E W S

Aug. 21, 2003
Forward to a friend!


The Problem with PCs, Revisited

"Dell," said Hewlett-Packard Chairman and CEO Carly Fiorina in her HP 
World keynote Aug. 12, "is not a technology company....they're a 
distribution company." 

Fiorina made this somewhat profound comparison in front of a room 
packed with people more likely to buy big-ticket HP enterprise hardware, 
software and services than cheap PC clones. To the HP World crowd, 
Fiorina's observation dramatically clarifies the enormous difference between 
the two companies. 

But to PC-obsessed Wall Street, the press and the public, her statement 
would be less meaningful. In fact, distribution is what the 
cookie-cutter clone business is all about. And Dell has perfected a system for 
taking other people's technology innovations, and selling them as fast, 
reliable PCs-to-order over the phone and the Internet. That's what 
customers want, and that's what the marketplace rewards. 

HP is an incredibly innovative company. But when it comes to PCs, HP is 
also a distribution company. All PC companies are distribution 
companies. 

I wrote in a February, 2002, HP World Magazine editorial that HP should 
get out of the consumer PC market entirely. I argued that PCs will 
always be a low-margin business for companies like HP. They should focus on 
the enterprise, printing and imaging and all the other areas where HP's 
innovativeness can clobber the competition and generate profits. 

Page one of the "Marketplace" section in Today's Wall Street Journal 
says it all. The right-hand column is a story about how Dell announced 
dramatic and unexpected price cuts fewer than 24 hours after HP said it 
would raise PC prices to boost earnings ("Dell Price Cuts Put a Squeeze 
on Rival H-P"). The story illustrates how in the PC market, Dell's 
distribution model enables them slash prices well below other companies and 
still make a profit, while HP claims it can avoid losing money only by 
raising PC prices -- inevitably at the expense of market share, as 
price is the main differentiator for consumers.

The left-hand column of the same "Marketplace" page features "Personal 
Technology" columnist Walter Mossberg's hands-on test of HP's new DVD 
Movie Writer ("H-P Has an Easy Way to Let You Convert Old Videos into 
DVDs"). In a nutshell, the article makes it clear that HP has solved a 
problem almost all consumers have (deteriorating DVD tapes), and that 
nobody else has been able to solve adequately. 

On the right side of the page is HP the distribution company, battling 
the Mother of All Distribution Companies in a war over commodity clone 
hardware. The best possible outcome in this war is market share 
bragging rights in a high-visibility segment, but relatively tiny profits. 

On the left side of the page is HP the technology company, inventing 
whole new categories of consumer electronics (and for now enjoying 100% 
market share), launching 1.0-release products that work and solving real 
problems. 

I said it a year and a half ago, and I'll say it again: HP should get 
out of the low-cost, low-margin, low-innovation PC business and focus 
all its energies on product and service areas where HP's technological 
superiority matters.  -- Mike Elgan

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
* * * SPONSOR * * *

Rediscover your COBOL assets. . .

With Acucorp's extend® family of solutions, you can modernize and 
migrate your HP e3000 applications to any of the more than 600 computing 
platforms we support including the HP Integrity server running HP-UX 11i 
v2, Linux or Windows Server 2003.  
For more information about Acucorp, or our support for HP, visit 
http://www.acucorp.com/hp and download our updated HP e3000 White 
Paper.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

News Feed

HP, Intel withdraw support for SCO forum

Major vendors have taken notice of the SCO Group's attack on Linux that 
has already provoked distaste and anger of the open-source and Linux 
community. The latest is that HP and Intel have disappeared from all 
marketing and press material of SCO's Forum 2003 conference in Las Vegas. 
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1224036,00.asp

Deutsche unit fined over client votes in HP-Compaq deal

The Securities and Exchange Commission fined Deutsche Asset Management 
$750,000 for neglecting to tell its clients that Deutsche's investment 
banking division was representing HP in the $18.6 billion HP-Compaq 
merger completed over a year ago. The SEC said Tuesday that the investment 
advisory unit of Deutsche Bank AG failed to disclose a material 
conflict of interest when it cast 17 million of its clients' shares in favor 
of the merger.
http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2003/08/18/daily25.html

HP to offer Altiris Local Recovery Pro on all HP Compaq business PCs

HP on Aug. 14 announced a local backup and recovery solution on all HP 
Compaq business desktop and notebook PCs. The Altiris Local Recovery 
Pro enables users to quickly recover data if information is accidentally 
deleted or the system is corrupted. 
http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/newsroom/press/2003/030814b.html

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PUBLICATIONS & CONTENT

Interex's New Web Portal for HP's High Performance Technical Computing

Interex's new Web portal for HP's High Performance Technical Computing 
is now available. In addition, we have updated our Linux portal page. 
Also check out our other dedicated portals, which cover HP-UX, HP e3000, 
HP 1000/RTE, OpenView, Windows, Security, Storage, Mobile, HP OpenVMS 
and HP NonStop.
http://www.interex.org/tech/hptc/portal.html

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
August HP World Magazine Online (monthly)

features

OpenView Realizes 'Adaptive' Vision
HP announced more than 30 new and updated OpenView products, providing 
customers with greater business stability, business efficiency and 
business agility-core components of HP's adaptive enterprise vision. 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/features1.jsp

The End of the e3000
You will no longer be able to buy an e3000 from HP as of Nov. 1. 
Whether you make the transition to another platform or stay on the e3000 
without HP's help, you don't want to let that date go by without some 
thought. 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/features2.jsp

Inside Interex
Interex member Donna Garverick puts her money where her mouth is. Read 
about her in our new feature, Inside Interex. 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/features3.jsp

The Heat Is On
Can Carly's new partner initiatives keep ProLiant servers ahead of the 
crowd? 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/features4.jsp

editorial 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/01edit.jsp

wheels and deals 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/pub_hpw_prods_wheels.jsp

products & services 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpw308/pub_hpw_prods.jsp

**********************************************************************

	Get HP World, the print magazine, delivered to your home or office 
FREE! 
	Click here to subscribe: 
http://www.interex.org/hpworldnews/hpworldsub.html

	Go to the Interex Web site each day for breaking HP news: 
	http://www.interex.org

	Talk with peers on the Interex Bulletin Board: 
	http://www.interex.org/cgi-bin/yabb1/YaBB.pl

	What is Interex?
	http://www.interex.org/inside/index.html

	We want to hear from you! Please send comments and ideas to: 
	editor@interex.org

HP World News is distributed weekly and archived on our Web site at 
http://www.interex.org/hpwnews/news.html

If you have any questions about Interex membership, please contact the 
Interex Membership Department at: membership@interex.org