HP podría volver a fabricar tabletas

Tras abandonar el negocio de tabletas hace un año aproximadamente, HP podría estar dado marcha atrás en su decisión. La compañía estaría creando una nueva unidad de negocio, Mobility, encargad de desarrollar el negocio de venta de tabletas, según un comunicado interno publicado en The Verge cuya autenticidad ha sido confirmada.

Todd Bradley, responsable del negocio de impresoras y ordenadores personales de HP es el autor del informe, donde se explica que además de las tabletas, la nueva unidad de negocio será responsable de “categorías y segmentos adicionales que creemos que pueden ofrecer un valor diferencial a nuestros clientes”. La unidad estaría dirigida por Alberto Torres, que se unió a HP tras salir de Nokia, donde fue responsable de MeeGo, y que empezaría en su nuevo puesto el 3 de septiembre.

Esta información sale a la luz una semana después de que HP anunciara la escisión de WebOS como una nueva compañía que recibirá el nombre de Gram.

HP abandonó el mercado de tabletas el año pasado. Entonces se dedicaba a la venta de la TouchPad, que estaba basada en el sistema operativo WebOS y que tuvo que liquidarse a precios irrisorios. Se prevé que los nuevos productos de la compañía pueden utilizar Windows 8 para tabletas, que Microsoft ha desarrollado para hardware basado en Intel.

A continuación, el comunicado interno publicado en The Verge.

As the world’s largest PC and printing business, we make it matter for hundreds of millions of people each and every day. Today we are taking an important step to serve even more customers in new and exciting ways.

I am pleased to announce that we are creating a team dedicated to delivering the best mobility solutions in the industry. With this move, we are building on our commitment to re-invest in mobility via dedicated leadership, focused research and development, amazing new products and a growing suite of applications and services.

Our new Mobility Global Business Unit initially will focus on consumer tablets and will expand to additional segments and categories where we believe we can offer differentiated value to our customers. Our existing notebook teams, including our soon-to-be launched commercial tablet, will remain within the PC GBU under James Mouton at this time.

To lead the Mobility GBU, I am thrilled to announce that we have recruited a proven executive from the mobile-device industry. Alberto Torres, who most recently oversaw the MeeGo products and platform at Nokia as Executive Vice President, will join HP as Senior Vice President of Mobility, reporting to me.

I am excited to have Alberto join us. During his seven years at Nokia, he held a variety of critical leadership positions, including two years on the company’s Executive Board. In earlier roles at Nokia, Alberto ran the company’s premium brand, its accessory and CDMA businesses and corporate strategy. Prior to Nokia, he was a partner at McKinsey and Company, where he worked with industry leaders in mobile devices, consumer technologies, software and Internet services. A Ph.D in computer science from Stanford University, Alberto currently holds vice chairman roles with the firms Bang & Olufsen and Opera Software.

Alberto’s first order of business will be to accelerate our tablet strategy and begin to execute products against our consumer/SMB target. The exact structure of his team will follow that strategy.

Alberto’s start date will be September 3. Please join me in welcoming Alberto to HP and in supporting him and his team in their important work.

Regards,

Todd