Hewlett-Packard Co chief executive Lewis Platt was on hand to assure the assembly that its printer operating margins are above the corporate average, contrary to the declining gross margins seen in the printer market, making the business very profitable: he declined to talk about the company’s fourth-quarter earnings, which are expected this week, but in the 1993 fourth quarter, the company earned $298m or $1.18 a share, on sales of $5,700m and the consensus projection for the fiscal 1994 fourth quarter is $1.54 a share; Platt said that there are still growing opportunities in the printer market, such as digital imaging and video printing – such as the ability to print money-off coupons from a television set; printers aren’t the whole story of course, and the company has performed strongly in many areas, Platt said – the personal computer business is a tough market, but we are very encouraged, he said, and Hewlett-Packard has been able to be competitive in difficult pricing conditions; it has also had continued to turn in strong performances in such key product groups as personal computer servers, local networks and Unix servers, while the testing and measurement side shows renewed strength as well; Platt concluded by saying that the firm will continue to focus on ways to improve its relationship with customers.
Content from our partners
