[hn_throwaway_99]

I agree with this - I was trying to read between the lines about what felt like "face saving" from the author, and what were really executive leadership failures.

That said, Leo Apotheker was such a complete speed-run, unmitigated disaster for HP, that I'm inclined to have a ton of sympathy for the author and believe his point of view. I thought the author was actually overly generous to Apotheker - the Autonomy acquisition was a total failure of leadership and due diligence, and if Apotheker was the "software guy" he was supposed to be then the Autonomy failure makes him look even worse.

[rawgabbit]

Apotheker was the product of HP’s incompetent board. The board fired Mark Hurd who had rescued the company after Carly Fiorina’s disastrous tenure. Hurd, was investigated for sexual harassment, found innocent, and fired for inappropriate expenses.

The board then hired Apotheker whose grand strategy was to sell everything including the printer business and buy Autonomy a hot British company. The board signed off on this. It is the equivalent of selling your farm and tractor for some magical beans.

[mitthrowaway2]

The people at the top are paid a fortune because they're indeed the very best.

[tlogan]

I worked closely with SAP engineers throughout the 1990s and 2000s. In my experience, the company began to significantly decline after Leo Apotheker assumed leadership.

While Henning may not have been particularly business-savvy, Leo demonstrated a fundamental lack of understanding of SAP’s value network and how software should be build. He was just a money guy.