HP considers ousting Apotheker, Bloomberg reports
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News agency reports that Hewlett-Packard's board of directors is mulling CEO ouster in wake of strategic overhaul
It has been reported that the board of directors at Hewlett-Packard met today to discuss ousting CEO Leo Apotheker, just weeks after he launched a drastic strategic overhaul of the company.
Citing "two people familiar with the matter", the Bloomberg news agency says former eBay CEO and failed California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman is being considered as his replacement. Whitman joined the HP board in January this year.
Shares in the company jumped 10% on the news, adding more than $3 billion to the company's market capitalisation in a matter of hours.
HP's share price had fallen more than 20% last month when it announced several radical changes including the acquisition of British software company Autonomy, the unexpected exit from the mobile device market and the exploration of "strategic options" for its PC businesss.
The Bloomberg report is the latest in a string of apparent leaks from HP. Bloomberg broke the news of HP's Autonomy acquisition before it was announced officially, and in May the company was forced to report its financial results early after an internal memo was obtained by the press in which Apotheker warned executives of "another tough quarter".
