SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) ? Hewlett-Packard Co is on the verge of naming former eBay Inc Chief Executive Meg Whitman its new CEO, replacing Leo Apotheker at the helm of the largest U.S. technology company, two sources told Reuters on Thursday.
The company is preparing to announce the decision, which would elevate Whitman to full CEO rather than have her serve in an interim capacity, after markets close, two sources said.
One of the sources added that the board was not preparing to make changes to its strategy, contrary to Wall Street speculation that Apotheker's departure might presage a backtracking on major strategic decisions during his term.
Those included a possible spinoff of its huge personal computer division -- the world's largest -- and the planned acquisition of British software maker Autonomy Corp Plc, which has some investors worried that HP is overpaying.
HP's board convened again Thursday to thrash out a host of issues, including jettisoning Apotheker, who in less than a year on the job slashed sales forecasts several times, backtracked on promises to integrate mobile software into devices and struggled to halt a 50 percent plunge in the share price.
The company's shares dived more than 4.5 percent to $22.88, wiping out much of Wednesday's 6.6 percent gain. Investors' enthusiasm over a change at the top has waned and the Street has turned its attention toward HP's uncertain fundamentals, analysts say.
The storied Silicon Valley giant is fighting to restore its crumbling credibility. If Whitman took the reins, she would have to galvanize growth at a company that gets more than a third of its revenue from a slowing Europe, and struggling to offset sliding PC revenue with services and software.
"Some might be saying maybe Meg Whitman isn't the right person either. She's not a hardware person," said Auriga analyst Kevin Hunt. But HP "just needs someone to set the direction." QUESTIONS?
Whitman's record at eBay came under scrutiny during an ill-fated campaign for California's governorship. Analysts have questioned whether her stewardship of eBay prepared her to steer a sprawling enterprise and computer giant.
The billionaire former CEO is credited with catapulting eBay into the upper echelons of a then-nascent e-commerce arena, and taking it public. But critics note she pushed hard to acquire Internet telephony service Skype, beginning a long and ultimately fruitless attempt to wring value from it. Ebay eventually unloaded it, and it ended up with Microsoft Corp.
"While we believe she has proven to be a very capable manager helping grow eBay from a start-up into one of the largest Internet companies, we think an ideal candidate for HPQ should have extensive experience in the enterprise market," Stern Agee analyst Shaw Wu said in a client note. He mentioned better choices included HP enterprise chief Dave Donatelli and PC head Todd Bradley, two names that had also made the rounds in Silicon Valley for the top job after Mark Hurd's ouster.
The full HP board has not formally voted on Whitman's appointment as CEO but the process to usher her in was on track, the two sources told Reuters.
Tech blog AllThingsD first reported that Whitman was poised to be named CEO, citing multiple sources. HP and Whitman declined to comment.
(Reporting by Poornima Gupta and Peter Henderson, writing by Edwin Chan; editing by Gunna Dickson)
Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/business/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110922/bs_nm/us_hp
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