I'm still wondering how they're still in business.
A "least worst" enterprise vendor?
Why is the dollar still strong? The theory I like is because all competing currencies are worse. And while I don't know the competing enterprise market as well, I don't get the impression that today HP has seriously better competitors in full service classic enterprise space (this of course ignores paradigm shifts like the cloud, where I'm sure AWS and company are eating the lunch of various enterprise categories, storage for one).
Who's noticeably better than them? Sun and DEC weren't, IBM sure doesn't sound like they have been any time recently (and for service service they've joined the race to the bottom), who else is there? I don't know, it's not a field I follow anymore.
... this of course ignores paradigm shifts like the cloud, where I'm sure AWS and company are eating the lunch of various enterprise categories, storage for one
HN has its own distortion bubble here. It takes a long (decades) time for new technology / best practices to penetrate into large organizations in stable, established markets.
But I think two things are changing that. One: upstream vendor migration to cloud / more modern solutions (e.g. Salesforce). Which decreases in-house footprint. Two: younger talent that's more familiar with modern ways of doing things (working with AWS, cattle services on commodity boxes, etc).
I think one of the greatest failures of enterprise companies is that they've historically done a terrible job at making their hardware / software available to students. Which means no reasonably-priced supply of knowledgeable potential employees.
And if the TCO of a mainframe / COBOL solution includes scouring the globe for the one remaining person who knows how to work on it and then paying them a premium to do so...? Well, that'll get enterprise (still slowly) moving.
A "least worst" enterprise vendor?
Why is the dollar still strong? The theory I like is because all competing currencies are worse. And while I don't know the competing enterprise market as well, I don't get the impression that today HP has seriously better competitors in full service classic enterprise space (this of course ignores paradigm shifts like the cloud, where I'm sure AWS and company are eating the lunch of various enterprise categories, storage for one).
Who's noticeably better than them? Sun and DEC weren't, IBM sure doesn't sound like they have been any time recently (and for service service they've joined the race to the bottom), who else is there? I don't know, it's not a field I follow anymore.