HP Battered By PC Sales Slump

HP has reported concerning losses across most of its business groups as global demand for PCs continues to fall.

Revenue slipped 8.1 percent in its Q2 results this week, falling to $25.35 billion (£16.5bn), with the firm’s PC and printer business down 11.5 percent.

Net income for the three month to July 31 fell £544 million, down from £628 million the same time last year.

Down

Software revenue was down 6 percent year over year with a 20.6 percent operating margin. License revenue was down 11 percent, support revenue was down 3 percent, professional services revenue was down 8 percent and software-as-a-service (SaaS) revenue was down 4 percent.

In fact, ‘down’ seemed to be the theme-du-jour for HP’s results. There was some solace found, however, in HP’s enterprise group. The division’s revenue inched up 2 percent year over year with a 13 percent operating margin. Industry Standard Servers revenue was up 8 percent, but storage revenue was down 2 percent.

“HP delivered results in the third quarter that reflect very strong performance in our Enterprise Group and substantial progress in turning around Enterprise Services,” said Meg Whitman, HP CEO.

“I am very pleased that we have continued to deliver the results we said we would, while remaining on track to execute one of the largest and most complex separations ever undertaken.”

HP is due to split into two separate companies on 1 November this year.

The move will see HP Inc look after the firm’s PC and printing businesses, while Hewlett-Packard Enterprise will focus on corporate hardware services, encompassing the firm’s storage, server and networking units as well as its cloud infrastructure and services unit.

Whitman has resisted pressure from analysts and shareholders to sell off the company’s PC business, a move also suggested by former CEO Leo Apotheker, arguing computers were important to HP’s overall business.

Take our cloud quiz here!