HP
Adaptive Enterprise
In
two days of briefings, HP’s Adaptive Management Software Group
focused on the software portfolio HP is building and how that
portfolio is being deployed as an asset for HP customers – and a
leverage point for HP hardware and services.
In
the “new” HP, software (that is, infrastructure software) is
treated as a serious business and HP means to be an important
player. It has been
building out its portfolio for the past year, with enhancements to
existing products and selected acquisitions, such as Novadigm and
Consera (see Opinions, February 15, 2004, http://www.wohl.com/wa04-11.htm).
This
is an ongoing process and just after the briefing (literally), HP
made an additional acquisition, alluded to during the meeting,
adding the user provisioning product TruLogica.
TruLogica’s contextual management permits it to map IT
processes into business processes and will integrate with other HP
integration products such as the Talking Blocks acquisition.
HP says the product is fast to deploy and easy to use,
promising users a quick time to value.
This product will be included with other HP security software
and with the previous acquisition SelectAccess, but it will also
continue to be offered as a standalone product.
TruLogica is already integrated at the Directory level; next
it will be integrated at the administrative interface level.
In
recent days, following the briefing, HP has continued a rapid pace
of announcement activity, including:
- Announcing
a relationship with HP to provide Opteron hybrid 32/64 bit high
speed servers for the HP ProLiant line.
This means that AMD is now available on servers from
three major vendors, HP, IBM, and Sun, a clear win for the Intel
competitor, and a vote of confidence for their Opteron
processor. For HP, this is merely a matter of making sure that they
offer a full selection of choices to customers.
- HP
has announced a plan to sell Linux PCs in Asia.
For an important Microsoft partner like HP, this is a
clear departure, but the Asian market is too important – and
too open source oriented – to pass up.
HP will offer PC’s pre-installed with Turbolinux, a
popular Linux distribution in Asia, in nine Asian countries
including Korea, China, and Japan.
HP Linux PCs will also include OpenOffice 1.1.
- HP has announced renewed emphasis on their
SmartOffice SMB initiative as part of their recent channel
partner meeting. This
included additional products, an emphasis on their prime
position across the SMB market in PCs, servers, and printers,
and more emphasis on services, partner support, and solutions.
HP has signed letters of intent with Intuit and SAP to
provide their solutions to HP SMB customers as part of the
SmartOffice program.
At the end of this week, HP EVP Peter Blackmore, in a briefing to
analysts, announced quarterly results and the anticipated
reorganization that will take place in May.
At that time, the Go to market assets of HP will be segmented
both by broad market segments (enterprise, SMB, and public sector)
and also by some vertical markets (telco, financial services, health
care, and government). These will report to Blackmore.
Hardware, software, and services will report to Ann
Livermore.
At the same time, the company will move toward a three-region
segmentation. No
account management changes are contemplated to minimize customer
disruption.
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