The Chairman of tech titan Hewlett-Packard,Ray Lane,has resigned along with two board members in an effort to clear the decks for CEO Meg Whitman's turnaround effort.Lane will stay on as a director,and activist investor Ralph Whitworth will assume the Chairman's role.
The Chairman runs the board,while the CEO runs the company.
The company is trying to recover from several disastrous moves in recent years,such as the botched acquisition of UK firm Autonomy and the unsuccessful tenure of Leo Apotheker as CEO.
We really want to see more fundamental changes in the board,said Anne Simpson,Senior Portfolio Manager and Director For Corporate Governance of CalPERS,the California Public Employee Retirement System,a major HP shareholder.We still don't think it's possible to take that fresh look that's needed.
This is chapter one in the new playbook for Hewlett-Packard.Think about the role of the auditor.You really need to be thinking about fresh eyes for the audit.Ralph Whitworth is stepping in to find the permanent Chairman.This is not Ralph's role.He's a catalyst,and that's a very important thing when a board has got itself into trouble.
We need a board that will stick around and back the new strategy.Shareholders now have the ability to intervene directly if the board doesn't succeed,and that's very important,Ms.Simpson pointed out.
CEO Meg Whitman unveiled the company's new Moonshot server on Monday,a super-dense server for hyperscale data centers and an attempt to find a product that will make up for declining PC sales.
RBC Capital Markets is maintaining its sector perform rating on the stock.
Hewlett-Packard(HPQ)
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