Hewlett-Packard last night named former eBay chief Meg Whitman as its new president and chief executive officer, replacing Leo Apotheker at the helm of the world's biggest computer maker.
Whitman, 55, stepped down in 2008 at eBay, the internet auction giant, and last year made an unsuccessful run to replace Arnold Schwarzenegger as California governor, losing to Democratic veteran Jerry Brown.
"We are fortunate to have someone of Meg Whitman's caliber and experience step up to lead HP," said Ray Lane, who was named executive chairman of the computer giant.
"We are at a critical moment and we need renewed leadership to successfully implement. Meg is a technology visionary with a proven track record of execution,'' he added.
Among the changes at HP, Ray Lane has moved from non-executive chairman to executive chairman of the board of directors, and the board intends to appoint a lead independent director, a company statement said.
The shake-up comes with HP struggling for direction despite its leadership in the PC business. Analysts said the change was "a step towards regaining credibility with investors" but warned that "the path to a full recovery of investors' faith in management and the company's earnings power will take several quarters, if not longer."
They said that Whitman "brings strong technology industry relationships and leadership experience at a fast growing technology company but will need to prove to investors that she can make similar smart strategic decisions while running a much larger, more complex business" than at eBay.
Apotheker, a veteran of German business software giant SAP, took over HP in November and has been refocusing the company on software and cloud services - offering applications and storing data services over the Internet.
But HP shares have fallen over 40% since Apotheker replaced Mark Hurd, who resigned following a sexual harassment accusation. HP shares plunged 20% on a single day last month after Apotheker announced a dramatic strategic shakeup at the world's top personal computer maker that includes spinning off its PC business.
HP announced on August 18 it was exploring a spin-off of its PC unit and buying British enterprise software company Autonomy for $10.24 billion as it refocuses on software and technology solutions.
In a further move away from the consumer space, HP said that it was stopping production of its TouchPad tablet computer, its rival to Apple's iPad, and phones based on the webOS mobile operating system acquired from Palm last year for $1.2 billion.
