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HP, Compaq India units merge

Fakir Chand in Bangalore

Even as the merger battle between Hewlett-Packard and Compaq raged on globally the two companies continued to operate as separate entities in India.

But the Indian units of the two comapnies finally merged when on Thursday Compaq India managing director, Balu Doraisamy announced in Bangalore that he will be the overall head of the four core business groups of the combined entity.

While Doraisamy will head the HP Enterprise Services Group, HP's executive Ravi Aggarwal will be in charge of HP Imaging and Printing Group.However, no comment was forthcoming regarding the status of HP India's president Arun K Thiagarajan.

Besides Doraisamy, two other Compaq executives, Kapil Jain and Ravi Swaminathan will be heading the HP Services Group and HP Personal Systems Group, respectively.

Doraisamy told rediff.com that four more core business groups were being formed that will take care of HP's other activities in the sub-continent.

Doraisamy refused to comment on the number of employees who will be retrenched as part of the global company's policy to reduce staff by 15,000.

Dismissing media reports that 200 people, both executives and laterals, have already been handed the pink slips, Doraisamy said: "How can we afford to lay off 25 per cent of the combined staff strength. Though size does matter, the retrenchment will not be of that order."

As a result of this merger the revenue of the combined entity will be much more than that of its main rival, IBM India.

According to Dataquest, a leading IT trade magazine, HP's India revenues during FY 2001 was around Rs 15 billion, while Compaq India notched up Rs 17 billion as against IBM India's revenue of Rs 16.50 billion.

" Though the guideline for this year is not so rosy as market growth is expected to be flat, India will continue to be an exciting market for the merged HP entity, said Doraisamy.

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