Two months ago, HP announced that it was considering spinning off its massive consumer PC business into its own separate company. Such a move would create a new organization with over $40 billion in yearly revenue. Now The Wall Street Journal is reporting via unnamed sources that analysts working for the company have given the opinion that HP might be better off keeping the PC division in house. The idea to spin off the PC business was made under HP"s now former CEO Leo Apotheker. However, Apotheker was kicked out of the job a few weeks ago by HP"s board of directors and replaced by former eBay CEO Meg Whitman.
While Apotheker was in charge, HP made it clear that it was strongly considering a spin off of the PC business, even going so far as to run a national newspaper ad in September that explained its thinking on the matter. At that time HP said having the PC business as a stand alone company would allow it to be "a more agile organization to help us better anticipate change and quickly respond to customers."
But that attitude may have changed now that Whitman is in place. The Wall Street Journal claims that according to HP"s analysts, spinning off the PC division could result in lower profit margins for some products. It could also reduce HP"s buying power with the PC component makers along with making the PC supply chain more complicated. Whitman has already said that a final decision on the HP PC business would be made by the end of October.