Shake Up At H-P (HPQ)

Not happy with the direction the company was going, Hewlett-Packard HPQ decided it shake up its board, ousting 4 board members, and bringing in 4 new ones, including former eBay EBAY CEO Meg Whitman. In addition to Whitman, HP added Shumeet Banerji, CEO of Booz & Co; Gary Reiner, the former chief information officer of General Electric Co GE, Patricia Russo, former CEO of Alcatel-Lucent ALU and Dominique Senequier, CEO of AXA Private Equity to its board. Analysts said that this change made sense, given the new CEO HP has, Leo Apotheker. "This change was two things -- the handling of the Mark Hurd situation, which was very controversial, and that with a new CEO it makes sense to have someone new," said Kaufman Bros analyst Shaw Wu. "With Leo coming in as CEO, we both thought it was appropriate to look at the board," HP Chairman Ray Lane said in an interview. Gleacher & Co analyst Brian Marshall was positive on the news, and said investors should be as well. "To shake it up a little bit and get some of the old-school guys out of there and get some new-school blood in there, highlighted by Meg Whitman, this is a positive development," he said. At last check, shares of HPQ were up 37 cents to $47.15, a gain of 0.8%.