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HP's New Unit Meant to Spur Storage

Posted by James Rogers on January 18, 2007

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HP, stung by recent poor storage performance, has formed a new software unit in an attempt to boost its data management story. (See HP Forms New Unit and HP Reports Q4.)

The new Business Information Opimization unit is the first step in a broader repositioning strategy, as HP looks to emulate its rival IBM by wrapping services around storage software in an attempt to lock large customers into its technology. Roadmap details remain fuzzy.

HP execs say the new unit will sell software and hardware, including storage gear, from across the company. A business intelligence wing will be responsible for Neoview, a high-end data warehousing product that HP has been developing for the last two years. A separate information management wing will focus on archiving and management of data.

At this stage, the vendor is keeping specific product details under wraps, although execs confirmed that these are likely to involve solutions geared toward specific verticals. For instance, one solution set could be geared toward helping telecom firms cope with customer churn, while another would help airlines handle bookings.

The business intelligence wing is headed by former IBM and Teradata exec Ben Barnes, who told Byte and Switch that HP will be formally unveiling its Neoview product sometime in the spring. "Our first thrust is to have a very robust industry standard data warehousing platform," he says, adding that sector-specific solutions will come sometime later.