HP’s newly-appointed CEO, Meg Whitman, announced yesterday that the company would be keeping its PC division. The previous CEO, Léo Apotheker, planned to cut this division of the company in order to focus on laptops and its smaller and more personal products. His reason for propositioning this was to gain a higher profit margin (greater control over profits and products compared to competitors), but Whitman’s reasoning is that their PC division is what makes HP one of the USA’s 70 largest companies (Hardy).

My reasoning for supporting Whitman’s decision is not only my personal attachment to the company (all of the computers and laptops in my household for the past 7-odd years have been Hewlett-Packard), but also because HP personal computer systems are recognized and established in the market. As outlined in Quentin Hardy’s article, Whitman admitted that she gets asked “what is HP?” often, meaning that the company is having a brand identity crisis. They need to recognize internally what they are first, but in my opinion, their sleek and affordable PC’s are a crucial product that must be incorporated into their brand image.