A former vice president of Hewlett-Packard's printing division has been indicted by federal prosecutors for allegedly sharing with HP confidential information from his previous employer.
First reported by Wired, the indictment was filed Friday in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif. As director of sales and business development in IBM's printing division in March 2006, Atul Malhotra allegedly requested confidential information about IBM pricing. Just two months later, Malhotra took the position of vice president of HP's printing division.
In the indictment, prosecutors say Malhotra e-mailed the IBM information, marked "confidential," to an unnamed HP senior vice president on July 25, 2006, and again to another HP senior vice president two days later.
He was fired shortly thereafter, in September 2006, according to HP.
"The activity with which Malhotra is charged was in direct violation of clear HP policies, including HP Standards of Business Conduct," the company said in a statement. "HP detected this activity, conducted an internal investigation, terminated Malhotra's employment from HP, and reported the activity to appropriate enforcement agencies and to IBM. HP has cooperated fully with the government's investigation."
Hewlett-Packard announced a significant reorganization Wednesday of its most profitable division, paring five groups down to three within the printing and imaging division, according to published reports.
HP would not comment on whether jobs cuts would accompany the reorganization, but an HP representative told The New York Times and San Jose Mercury News that a "rebalancing" of its workforce would likely occur. The three new groups will focus on consumers and small businesses; large enterprises; and graphics that cater to large-scale printing of billboards, signs and professional photography, the Times reported.
The reorganization, announced by Vyomesh Joshi in an internal memo, is part of an effort to expand its business from computer printers to a wider range of printing activities. Joshi will remain the head of the division.
"We're moving from being a printer company to a printing company," spokesman Ryan Donovan told the Mercury News.
In May, HP reported that the division earned $2.38 billion on revenue of $14.9 billion in the first six months of its fiscal year.
It may be sitting pretty atop the PC market, but Hewlett-Packard isn't going to sit still.
The world's largest PC manufacturer plans to roll out 50 new products Tuesday at a conference in Berlin, the largest such product refresh in the Personal Systems Group's history. Of those products, HP added new touches to just about everything, freshening up its TouchSmart all-in-one desktop, commercial and consumer notebook lines, as well as two machines within its high-end gaming brand, Voodoo PC.
While it's that time of year for product refreshes, this is more than the usual speed bump or spec tweak. Though competitors like Dell, Acer, and Lenovo are increasingly focusing on consumer retail PCs, HP is showing that it doesn't want to give up any of the ground it's gained over the last couple quarters.
"They're fortunate for being in right place at right time: being in consumer, and being in retail," said Richard Shim, PC analyst with IDC. "They're showing they're not taking that for granted, and keeping consumers engaged in the products."
It's a tough task when most PCs are made by the same manufacturers with products from shared suppliers. That's where HP hopes its new and improved TouchSmart PC comes in.
It's slimmed down in size--far more minimalist in design concept--and price compared with the original model, but the key is really the improved touchscreen interface. Exterior design used to be a way to stand out, but with a category in decline like desktops, a unique software experience could be an attention-getter.
Offering an experience that you can't get from a Windows-based Dell, or even an Apple iMac, is complicated, said Shim. "That really separates the major players from the minor players, since only the big guys can afford to do this kind of thing. HP is taking advantage of its position in the market."
The new HP-only interface is also a kind of "end-run" around Microsoft's Windows we'll be seeing more often, said Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis for The NPD Group.
It's already happening in the mininotebook category, where instead of being limited to one option for an operating system, PC vendors are offering different flavors of Linux, as well as alternate interfaces that sit on top of Windows.
Design continues to be a priority for HP, as evidenced by the new products, from the high-end to the refreshed line of consumer notebooks, to the new brushed aluminum finish for its commercial Elite line.
But it's the Voodoo brand where HP is most able to experiment with new looks.
Last week, Rahul Sood, Voodoo PC's founder and current CTO of HP's global gaming business, released photos of him cutting his birthday cake with the famously thin MacBook Air. In the accompanying blog, Sood slyly remarked that he "wouldn't be needing this notebook for long anyways."
The Voodoo Envy 133
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)That's because HP's got its own razor-thin notebook now, called the Voodoo Envy 133. Though the price (starts at $2,099) puts the machine out of reach for most mainstream PC buyers, the ultrathin and light Envy is HP's attempt to position the Voodoo brand name in the same arena as Apple and Lenovo. For now Voodoo still has limited awareness outside the gaming and performance PC enthusiast crowds. As with the Blackbird 002 gaming desktop, the Envy will tie HP's recognizable brand to up-and-coming Voodoo.
The other Voodoo product released Tuesday is a departure for the brand in another way. A new gaming tower, the Voodoo Omen, is unlike anything HP has released before, and has no real counterpart in terms of design in the gaming world. The Omen is stark and simple on the outside, with brushed aluminum tower with the Voodoo logo on the face replacing colorful plastic. It's nearly the exact opposite of last year's Blackbird, or
Despite all this, there's still big challenges for HP ahead as it attempts to differentiate its products from the rest of the field and offer a wide array of products. Not only are they trying to take on Apple in terms of design and innovation, but it's still doing battle with and old, but suddenly resurgent foe, Dell. Plus, Acer is selling notebooks like hotcakes, and even Asus is trying to push its way into the consciousness of the mainstream PC buyer.
So despite the progress the company has made, HP can't get comfortable.
"The challenge for them, is that other guys will do same thing," observed Shim of IDC. "The difficulty for HP is to integrate new technology and new innovation and still remain price competitive."
Hewlett-Packard said Tuesday that it has chosen a new chief sales officer.
Don Grantham has been chosen to fill the role immediately, and will report to HP's executive vice president of the Technology Solutions Group, Ann Livermore. Enterprise accounts, public sector customers, as well as communications, media and entertainment, financial services, and manufacturing and distribution sales will fall under his purview.
Grantham is a tech industry veteran. He was previously the executive vice president for global sales and service at Sun Microsystems, and before that, held various sales positions at IBM.
He will replace Andy Mattes, who was moved on to become HP's senior vice president and general manager of its outsourcing services business.
Private investigators, be warned: if you spy on journalists on behalf of Hewlett-Packard, knowing state and federal laws prohibit you from obtaining their phone records through dubious means, you may end up paying a whopping penalty of $3,000.
That's the message the Federal Trade Commission delivered on Wednesday when announcing the $3,000 settlement with Joseph Depante and Matthew Depante of Action Research Group. The settlement (PDF) reached before a Florida judge and approved by the FTC commissioners allows the Depantes to admit no wrongdoing and characterizes the $3,000 payment as "equitable monetary relief" and not a fine.
HP hired Action Research Group to uncover the source of boardroom leaks to journalists--including three CNET News.com reporters. (As part of the spying scandal, HP contractors and investigators obtained the home and mobile telephone records of the reporters and their family members, sent e-mail bugs as attachments, and secretly followed and photographed News.com reporter Dawn Kawamoto and her daughter. The reporters have since sued HP and the cases are pending in state court in San Francisco.)
The FTC said in a press release that the $3,000 equitable monetary relief was due to the Depantes' claimed "inability to pay" a larger penalty of $67,000. The Depantes did agree not to violate federal privacy laws in the future and will notify the FTC of their whereabouts and employment status for the next three years.
After HP hired Action Research Group to look for the source of leaks, the group contracted with other investigators to "pretext"--that is, dupe--phone companies into handing over records of telephone calls belonging to the targeted journalists.
Matthew DePante pleaded no contest to one count of fraudulent wire communications in Santa Clara County Superior Court in San Jose, Calif. As a result, he was required to complete 96 hours of community service--with no jail time--and the charge was scheduled to be dismissed upon completion of the community service.
In addition, the federal court in Florida entered a default judgment against other defendants: Eye in the Sky Investigations, Cassandra Selvage, and Bryan Wagner. Under default judgment rules, meaning they didn't show up in court to provide a defense, Wagner was ordered to pay $428,085, and ESI and Selvage a total of $110,762.
Ex-HP Chairman Patty Dunn faced criminal charges for her role in the scandal; a judge dismissed those charges in March 2007. Dunn has apologized to the News.com reporters who were the subject of the illicit surveillance.
Sure, recycled paper is nice, but what about feeding it through a recycled printer?
Not as in refurbished and resold, but a new Deskjet that is composed of 83 percent recycled plastic. Hewlett-Packard is introducing a new green-focused label for some of its peripherals, and one of the first items under that label is the aforementioned D2545 printer.
(Credit:
Hewlett-Packard)
HP hopes to tempt the environmentally conscious as well as those looking for a bargain with the D2545, which retails for $45. Even the ink cartridges it uses are made of recycled plastic resins.
The printer is one of several products that will fall under the HP Eco Highlights label. So far it also includes three LaserJet printers (P4015x, P4515x, and P4515xm models). HP says the label will list the environmental attributes of the product, and will eventually encompass all products the company offers.
HP recycles tons of dead tech products every year, so it makes sense that it's able to make products from the materials it recycles. So while consumers are becoming much more aware of the environmental impact of the products we use, and even businesses are beginning to see the boon that green policies are to their bottom lines, why not make this standard instead of an outlier?
HP responded that by 2010,100 percent of its Deskjet printers will contain some recycled materials, and will increase by three times the number of inkjet printers made from recycled materials.
If HP can do this with printers, why not make their PCs and other products from recycled materials too?
They wouldn't be the first to make eco-conscious PC casings. Fujitsu has been experimenting with corn-based resins in some of the laptops it is selling, and for the same price as the non-corn-based models.
Following its massive overhaul earlier this year, HP Labs will begin a more formal and focused program doing collaborative research with universities.
Beginning Wednesday, the research and development arm of Hewlett-Packard will begin accepting proposals from university researchers anywhere in the world.
Proposals will be accepted until mid-June, then judged and awarded in the fall. The winners will receive a grant ranging from $50,000 to $75,000, which is enough for each professor who wins to hire at least one graduate student, according to HP's Office of Open Innovation.
"In the past, we did a lot of collaboration with universities, but it didn't have the same kind of sharp focus," said Rich Friedrich, director of HP's Open Innovation Office.
The new focus at HP Labs, announced in March, is aligned around a smaller number of subset "labs" and five main areas of research, including information management, cloud computing, transforming analog content to digital, intelligent infrastructures, and sustainability.
Update: Are three cores better than two? Consumers now get the chance to decide. AMD's X3 Phenom processors are available in low-cost consumer systems from Hewlett-Packard (HP), Gateway, and eMachines.
Also, on the quad-core front, AMD said Wednesday that Dell is offering five server platforms based on the AMD "Barcelona" Opteron processor.
Gateway model GT5670 with Phenom X3 is priced at $549
(Credit: Best Buy)The AMD Phenom X3 8400 (2.1GHz) and 8600 (2.3GHz) are the first mainstream x86 processors to use three cores. "The value proposition is simple. Three cores versus two cores. You make the choice," Pat Moorhead, VP of Advanced Marketing at AMD, said in a recent interview.
The Gateway model GT5670 packs an X3 8400 processor (2.1GHz) with 2MB of L3 cache memory, 3GB (PC2-5300 DDR2) of main memory, an Nvidia GeForce 6150 SE graphics card, and a 320GB Serial ATA II hard disk drive with 8MB cache (7200 rpm). This configuration goes for $549 at Best Buy.
The HP Pavilion a6430f is eerily similar. It also comes with an X3 8400 Phenom, 3GB PC2-5300 DDR2 memory, and Nvidia GeForce 6150 SE graphics. However, instead of a 320GB hard disk drive, it doubles the capacity with a 640GB drive. This system is priced at $679. HP also offers the Pavilion a6450z series on its Web site with the X3.
The eMachines J4509 is being sold in Japan and features an X3 8400 and AMD 780G integrated graphics. With a 19-inch LCD display, it retails in Japan for just under $1,000.
The initial Phenom X3 processors will ship as the B2 "stepping" or version. The follow-on versions in the channel will be the B3, said Moorhead. The B3 version fixes the TLB bug, which AMD has said all along is an extremely rare occurrence and affects virtually no one except, possibly, very high-end customers. Any chips designated with a "50" suffix will be a processor that implements the fix in silicon.
AMD also recently announced the availability of four new Phenom X4 processors with the TLB bug fix. Led by the AMD Phenom 2.5GHz X4 9850 Black Edition processor (which is designed to be overclocked) and 2.4GHZ 9750, these CPUs will be matched with the AMD 790 series chipsets. The quad-core Phenoms are targeted at higher-end gaming segments.
In related news, AMD announced Wednesday that Dell servers using the quad-core AMD "Barcelona" Opteron processor include the PowerEdge SC1435, 2970, M605 blade server and 6950 platforms, as well as the new PowerEdge T605 tower server. Dell follows HP which already lists its ProLiant G5 servers with quad-core Opteron processors.
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Though CRT monitors have been made practically obsolete for consumers by the LCD industry, a few industries--photography/visual design/filmmaking--still cling to them for their nonpareil color quality.
Hewlett-Packard is trying to loosen their grip on those clunky desktop space-hoggers by offering a liquid crystal display for visual artist types that boasts the ability to show 1 billion colors for "one quarter" of the cost of other LCD monitors in this category.
At the National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas on Monday, Todd Bradley, vice president of HP's Personal Systems Group, announced that HP has teamed up with DreamWorks for a technology it calls DreamColor.
It will offer 30-bit color using LED-backlighting technology on a widescreen display that will work with a Mac or PC--not just HP products. The displays are intended to keep colors consistent throughout the creative process: from a display on a workstation to film and/or to print. Printers with DreamColor technology were introduced last year.
HP says it's only a "preview" announcement, which means it's not announcing pricing yet. The displays are scheduled to start shipping this summer.
Advanced Micro Devices said the long-delayed quad-core "Barcelona" Opteron processor is available in servers from computer vendors such as Hewlett-Packard.
HP G5 server series
(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)Barcelona had been delayed repeatedly due to production glitches and bugs. AMD is now shipping a "B3" version that includes the bug fix in silicon.
"Customers can get the quad-core AMD Opteron processor today in systems from HP, as well as other system providers," the chipmaker said in a release Tuesday night. The HP ProLiant G5 servers are the first of many systems that are expected to be available in the coming weeks from global OEMs and system builders, AMD said.
The Opteron 8300 Series is currently available in select HP servers at speeds of 2.2GHz (model 8354) and 2.3GHz (model 8356). Opteron 8300 series processors are targeted at multiprocessor servers that typically use four processors (16 cores).
AMD has updated its pricing with the 8360 (2.5GHz) listed at $2,149, the 8358 (2.4Hz) at $1,865, the 8356 at $1,514, and the 8354 at $1,165.
AMD also lists quad-core Opteron 2300 series processors, starting at $316 for the 2352 (2.1GHz) and ranging up to $1,156 for the 2360 (2.5Ghz). These are used typically in two-processor systems.
The quad-core 1300 series for single-processor systems ranges in price from the 1352 listed at $209 to the 1356 listed at $377.
"We are proud to be the first OEM to market with quad-core AMD Opteron processor-based servers," Paul Gottsegen, vice president of marketing for industry-standard servers at HP, said in a prepared statement.
Systems are also expected from IBM, Dell, and Sun Microsystems. IBM and Sun Microsystems have had systems waiting to take the chips since fall of last year.
Barcelona-based computers are also available from smaller vendors such as Rackable Systems and Supermicro, AMD said.
The chipmaker said Monday that it would reduce its workforce by 10 percent this year and that it expects to post first-quarter revenue of $1.5 billion, about 15 percent lower than the fourth quarter and well below seasonal declines.
