Anyone who would dare buy Hewlett-Packard’s shares must take four points as given. One: HP is badly managed. Sure, Meg Whitman got the top job after the acquisition of Autonomy. But would it be prudent to expect astute decision-making from HP’s leaders, given recent events? Two: four of HP’s five operating divisions (personal computers, printers, services, enterprise hardware) are facing secular declines in revenues, margin compression, or both. Again, the historical record and the performance of HP’s competitors make it foolhardy to bet any other way. Three: HP’s growing software business, is a bit, ah, hard to predict. After the Autonomy debacle, does anyone want to argue this? Four: HP’s revenue and cash flow are most likely in permanent decline. This last point follows from the first three.
如今若有任何人還敢買進惠普(HP)股票，那麼他們必須接受以下四個事實。首先，惠普管理不善。誠然，梅格•惠特曼(Meg Whitman)是在惠普收購Autonomy之後出任執行長的。但考慮到最近的一系列事件，仍然期待惠普的領導層能做出英明決策，這理智嗎？其次，惠普五大業務部門中的四個（個人電腦、列印產品、服務、企業硬體）正面臨營收長期下滑或（和）利潤率下降。考慮到惠普以往的記錄及其競爭對手們的表現，賭這種局面會改變同樣是魯莽的。第三，惠普的軟體業務儘管正在成長，但有點兒，怎麼說呢，前途叵測。在折戟Autonomy之後，還有人想要質疑這一點嗎？第四，惠普目前的營收和現金流下滑很可能將是一種長期趨勢。最後一點是由前三點推導出來的。