5. Leo Apotheker: Poor Decisions in Mobile Industry
Leo Apotheker was recruited as HP’s new CEO after the reasonably competent Mark Hurd left in disgrace following an allegation on sexual harassment. Under Mike Hurd, HP acquired Palm in an attempt to compete with Google and Apple in tablet industry. The HP TouchPad tablet was released in July 2011 and it quickly received numerous negative reviews. In attempt to make tablet consumers latch on the new product, HP quickly discounted the TouchPad from $499 to $100. Weeks went by and the product failed to sell through, by mid-August Best Buy reported that it only managed to sell 10 percent of its TouchPad units. After this failure, Apotheker decided to dismantle HP’s mobile hardware division, effectively terminating the production of TouchPad, Veer and Pre. Leo Apotheker was fired, following a sharp decline in stock price and a series of layoffs in Palm subsidiary.