No doubt phones were ringing all over Silicon Valley this morning as Hewlett Packard announced it would cut a massive 9,000 jobs. The announcement came with little detail -- but thanks to new updates this morning we know more.
HP will spend $1 billion to automate its commercial data centers. Those are the server farms that run clients' software. The company will also consolidate the number of centers from "about 100" according to executive vice president Anne Livermore "to about half that."
The change will cost 9,000 people their jobs, though those cuts will come over the course of several years. Further, HP hopes to create about 6,000 in sales and support. Specifically where those data centers are and which will be cut was not clear early Tuesday morning, and the company said the timing of the cuts would "vary by country to country" for legal reasons.
Clearly HP thinks the automation is a major step forward. Says Livermore, "We think the next 5 to 10 years will be all about automation ... and the changes will allow HP to reinvest in further growth."
