HPE is playing the spin-merge game to the benefit of all stakeholders

It’s always fun to see a new publication emerge and when it comes to supporting blogs, newsletters and magazines I am always up for the challenge. When the focus of a publication is purely NonStop then it is of particular interest to me and I will always find time to provide commentary on what is happening across the NonStop community. Clearly, for any enterprise with investments in NonStop the news coming from HPE seems never-ending and yet, the position of NonStop within HPE seems to be solidifying more quickly than any of us could have imagined only a couple of years ago.

If I was to summarize all that has transpired since HP announced the separation of consumer products from enterprise products, creating HP Inc. (HPQ) and HP Enterprise (HPE) then I have to write about the acquisitions, and perhaps more importantly, the “spin-mergers” we have seen of late. With the latest spin-merge, when it comes to vision and strategy, HPE is behaving with consistency; where HPE has sold HP Software to Micro Focus, gaining a 50.1% interest in the company when the deal finalizes sometime late in 2017.
In my most recent post Changes for the better? HPE to focus on what it does best; infrastructure and platforms! to the NonStop community blog, Real Time View, I reference the September 7, 2016, press release HPE Accelerates Strategy With SpinOff and Merger of Non-Core Software Assets With Micro Focus HPE to retain key software assets. “With today’s announcement, we are taking another important step in achieving the vision of creating a faster-growing, higher-margin, stronger cash flow company well positioned for our customers and for the future,” said Meg Whitman, President and Chief Executive Officer of HPE.

In a separate press release of September 7, 2016, CEO Meg Whitman on HPE’s Plans to Spin-Off & Merge Non-Core Software Assets With Micro Focus -Company doubles down on delivering software-defined hybrid IT solutions Whitman added, “When we launched the new HPE, we laid out a vision of being the industry’s leading provider of hybrid IT, built on the secure, next-generation, software-defined infrastructure that will run customers’ data centers today, bridge them to multi-cloud environments tomorrow, and enable the emerging intelligent edge that will power campus, branch and IoT applications for decades to come.”

What it all means can be best summed up as HPE focusing on infrastructure and platforms and of streamlining its operations under three core business groups within HPE’s Enterprise Group division: one focused on software-defined and cloud technologies, one focused on data center infrastructure, and one focused on edge technologies and the internet of things. NonStop continues to play a vital role within the Mission Critical Systems (MCS) even as all of MCS, including NonStop, becomes part of the strategically important data center infrastructure group and for the NonStop community this is perhaps the most significant change of all! Again, for more on these announcements, make sure you read the post, Changes for the better? HPE to focus on what it does best; infrastructure and platforms!

Richard Buckle
Cofounder and CEO