Posted on Thursday, August 23 2012 @ 13:13 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
TechWeek Europe
notes HP announced its largest ever loss after taking a $9.2 billion write-down on the value of its enterprise service business. Most of the charge comes from a $8 billion write-down for the 2008 acquisition of Texas-based services Electronic Data Systems (EDS), which was valued at $13.9 billion.
Whether that pressure lessens or increases in the next few quarters is something only time will tell, but at the moment those businesses and HP’s enterprise services division are the two top turnaround targets for CEO Meg Whitman and COO Cathy Lesjack.
The huge IT company 22 August reported that its earnings and sales continued to falter in Q3 2012 as the company just did meet Wall Street’s projections. HP’s profit was $2 billion/£1.2bn ($1 per share), which amounted to a 9 percent drop from the same period a year ago. Revenue fell 5 percent year-over-year to $29.7 billion (£18.7bn).
However, these numbers were predicated on an $9.2 billion (£5.8bn) write-down on its enterprise services business. This was largely the result of a previously announced $8 billion (£5bn) write-down for the 2008 acquisition of Texas-based services firm Electronic Data Systems Corp. and separate restructuring charges.
Including the $9.2 billion charge, HP’s quarter represented the biggest loss in the company’s 73-year history.
