HP Not Turning into Software Company, Still Puts Emphasis on It Though

HP's CEO Meg Whitman agreed to an interview recently, where she answered some general and some not so general questions, one of which dealt with the company's position in regards to software.

The interview conducted by CRN already exposed some information about what HP would like to do next, even if some hopes, like peace with Oracle, are unlikely to become reality.

It so happens that Whitman was also asked what her stance was in regards to HP's software capabilities.

The previous company head was very favorable to this side of the business, and even wanted for HP to be exclusively focused on it, even if it meant abandoning a $40 billion PC business (which did not happen, fortunately).

Whitman said that HP was, indeed, building its software expertise, but that the goal was to solve customer problems, not to actually become a software company.

Elaborating, she said that HP intends to pay close attention to three things: software, security and the newly-acquired Autonomy.

“We are in the software business. Not to transform ourselves into a software company, but to actually solve customer problems,” she said.

“We have staked out three areas that we want to be terrific at. First is the software that differentiates our hardware -- orchestration, monitoring, etc. Second is security. I know from my eBay days that it's an arms race -- the bad guys get better, the good guys get better, etc. And every CIO I have talked to, even medium businesses, is worried about security. Third is Autonomy, and Big Data/analytics.”

The technology portfolio isn't expected to go through many changes in the near term, although small acquisitions aren't excluded.

“It probably won't go beyond that, at least in the near term. We may make some acquisitions, orchestration and monitoring and other things, but as I told the Street, don’t look for any big acquisitions from HP, at least for the foreseeable future.”