????在經歷了一系列丑聞，更換了CEO，重建了董事會之后，科技巨頭惠普公司（HP） 終于以全新的面貌呈現在世人面前。不過新惠普走的似乎卻是另一家公司——IBM的路子。

????上上周惠普首席執行官李艾科和其他高管向股東、分析人士和媒體介紹了新惠普的發展愿景。這些愿景讓人很難不想到IBM。IBM就像一個“影子巨人”，影響著惠普董事會的決策走向。

????李艾科為惠普規劃了一幅十分動人，但又模糊不明的前景。

????? 構建一個開放的在線市場，使消費者和企業可以在這里購買各種應用程序。

????? 構建 “基礎架構即服務”（infrastructure-as-a-service）和“平臺即服務”（platforms-as-a-service）等產品功能，以使企業能夠使用基于云計算的軟件。

????? 推出1億臺運行webOS操作系統的設備，其中許多設備將連接到惠普的基礎架構上。

????有些投資者的期望遠遠不止如此，他們希望惠普采取更多舉措，例如進行徹底重組，或甩掉利潤率偏低的個人電腦部門。不過他們從李艾科那里得到的卻是波瀾不驚的愿景——IT業將進一步演化；云計算的破壞性力量；惠普的角色被定義為一個包羅萬象的提供商……李艾科說道：“我們所有人都需要一個值得信賴的伙伴來一起探索這個新世界，除了惠普之外，還有誰能實現這種領導能力呢？”

????惠普首席財務官凱瑟琳?賴斯嘉稍后也提到了云計算，并大膽斷言：“惠普正著眼于業界未來的發展方向。然后她問道：“除了惠普之外，還有誰有如此上佳的定位？還有誰像惠普一樣，具有強大的、可持續的優勢？”

????請注意她的修辭：惠普并沒有滿懷自信地表示自己是唯一一家引領新一代“云經濟”的公司，而是在問：除了惠普之外，還有誰能做到這一點。惠普每次拋出這個問題，答案都不言自明——IBM。就連惠普的收益預測也在模仿IBM。上周IBM預測道，截止2015年，IBM的收益將增長11.4%。而本周惠普也表示，截止2014年，它的收益率將增長11.2%，這個數字幾乎與IBM的一模一樣。

????長期以來，惠普和IBM一直是競爭對手。幾十年來，兩家公司在業界各領風騷。2002年，惠普斥資250億美元收購了個人電腦制造商康柏電腦公司（Compaq），明確了其未來發展方向。而IBM卻反其道而行之，向軟件和IT咨詢服務領域轉變，而這兩個領域的增長潛力和利潤率都要好于個人電腦業務。

????不過惠普也及時地在這些領域進行了擴張，它斥資140億美元收購了IT服務業巨頭EDS。因此惠普的營收也超過了IBM，其上一財年的銷售額達到1260億美元，相比之下，IBM上一財年的銷售額為1000億美元。不過在其它重要的衡量指標上，惠普仍相形見絀。盡管IBM的營收不如惠普，但IBM的凈利潤達到了148億美元，而惠普的凈利潤只有88億美元。而且惠普的市值僅為890億美元，而IBM的市值高達1880億美元，是惠普的兩倍。

????這還是李艾科的前任馬克?赫德拼命削減成本后的結果。馬克?赫德醉心于拉高利潤率，導致了惠普員工士氣不振，公司的創新能力也停滯不前。去年，IBM耗資60億美元用于研發，是惠普的研發支出的兩倍。

????當然，惠普的某些優勢也正是IBM所缺乏的，不過那些領域也正是IBM有意放棄的。例如2005年IBM將其個人電腦業務賣給了聯想，放棄了它的熱賣產品Thinkpad筆記本電腦。而目前惠普近三分之一的收入都來自于其個人電腦部門，但該部門的營業利潤率僅為5%。相比之下，惠普的軟件部門的利潤率為21%，但軟件收入占惠普總收入的比重還不足2.3%。

????因此，軟件將成為惠普未來的增長戰略的重要一環。也就是說，惠普要在這個IBM的核心優勢領域上奮起直追。而且像IBM一樣，惠普也正在進軍云計算領域。不過正如邁克爾?柯普蘭指出的那樣，在云計算領域，惠普將主要關注食物鏈的下端，而把高端留給那些已經在該領域站穩腳跟的云計算公司，比如甲骨文（Oracle）和IBM。

????在李艾科的演講中，他似乎深信，惠普與終端客戶的接觸，使惠普擁有了IBM所不具備的競爭優勢。仿佛只要有了1億臺安裝了webOS操作系統的設備，消費者和企業就會自動涌向惠普的云計算產品。不過事實究竟會怎樣發展，現在還不明朗。本質上，云技術就不依賴于設備的操作軟件。例如亞馬遜公司（Amazon）已經建立了十分成功的云業務——亞馬遜網絡服務（Amazon Web Services），但并不在乎設備采用的是哪種操作系統。

????不過IBM已經開始大步進軍“中層云”領域了。IBM最近宣布了構建一個“公共云”的計劃，并于本周表示，將投資3800萬美元在新加坡建立一個云計算數據中心。本月早些時候，IBM對投資者表示，到2015年為止，公司云服務的收入預計將達到70億美元。這可能意味著IBM要比惠普更善于把握業界未來的發展方向。

????因此，在上周的惠普股東大會前夜，一位IBM的高管對惠普嗤之以鼻，表示IBM在構建集成軟件和服務方面要比惠普“領先許多年”，也就不足為奇了。

????相比之下，在惠普股東大會之后的采訪環節上，李艾科的話很有辯解的意味。《紐約時報》（New York Times）引述了他的話：“我們沒有在追趕任何人，尤其是IBM。”而當《信息世界》（Infoworld editor）的一位編輯指出，惠普的資產組合“看起來與IBM幾乎100%的重合”時，李艾科不耐煩地回應道：“我想稍稍糾正你的話：是IBM與我們100%的重合。”

????不過，打嘴仗沒有任何意義。勝負是由市場決定的。如果惠普能夠在自己的戰爭中打贏IBM，那么一切批評的聲音都會煙消云散。不過，現在惠普的當務之急，是要在IBM的陰影之下證明自己。

????譯者：樸成奎

????Behold the new HP. After a series of scandals, a change in CEOs and a rebuilding of its board, the tech giant revealed the new HP to the world: It's still very much a company that wants to be another company -- IBM.

????Watching CEO Léo Apotheker and other HP (HPQ) executives present their vision last week to shareholders, analysts and reporters, it was hard not to think of IBM (IBM), the unnamed elephant sitting in HP's boardroom.

????Apotheker outlined an appealing if vague future for HP:

????? An open, online marketplace where consumers and companies alike could buy apps;

????? Features like infrastructure-as-a-service and platforms-as-a-service that allow companies to tap into cloud-based software;

????? 100 million devices running webOS, many of which will connect to HP's infrastructure.

????Some investors were hoping for much more -- a radical restructuring maybe, or plans to spin off the low-margin PC division. What they got was Apotheker's anodyne vision of an evolving IT industry, the disruptive force of cloud computing, and HP's role as a soup-to-nuts provider. "All of us need a trusted partner to navigate this new world," he said. "Who but HP could deliver this leadership?"

????Later, CFO Catherine Lesjak mentioned the cloud again before boldly declaring that "HP is skating to where the puck is going," (cue eye roll) and then asking, "Who else is as well positioned as HP is? Who else has as powerful and as sustained advantages?"

????Notice the rhetoric here: HP isn't saying with confidence it's the only company to usher in the new cloud economy, it's asking you who else can do it. Each time it did so, there was an implied answer: "IBM." HP is even mimicking IBM in its earnings forecast. Last week, IBM estimated its earnings would grow 11.4% through 2015. This week, HP said its earnings would grow through 2014 at the nearly identical rate of 11.2%.

????HP and IBM have long been rivals. Both were computing giants for decades, but while HP pinned the future on its $25 billion purchase of personal computer maker Compaq in 2002, IBM took the opposite approach, transitioning into software and IT consulting services, both areas that had more growth potential and better profit margins than the PC business.

????In time, HP expanded into these areas as well, helped in good part by its $14 billion acquisition of EDS, an IT services giant. As a result, HP surpassed IBM in revenue, bringing in $126 billion in sales in its last fiscal year, compared with IBM's $100 billion. But by other important metrics, HP still lagged: Despite smaller revenue, IBM's net profit of $14.8 billion dwarfed HP's $8.8 billion figure. And the market values IBM at $188 billion, double HP's market cap of $89 billion.

????And all this was in spite of severe cost cutting by Mark Hurd, Apotheker's predecessor. Hurd's obsession with driving up profits left the company's staff demoralized and its ability to innovate hamstrung. Last year, IBM spent $6 billion on research and development, twice as much as HP did.

????There are, of course, strengths that HP offers that IBM lacks, but these are generally areas where IBM has chosen not to do business. IBM sold its PC business, which made the popular Thinkpad laptop, to Lenovo in 2005. Today, nearly a third of HP's revenue comes from its PC division, which has an operating profit margin of 5%. By contrast, HP's software unit has a profit margin of 21%, but software makes up less than 2.3% of HP's total revenue.

????So software is going to be an important plank in HP's growth strategy going forward -- that is, HP is going to go hard after a core IBM competency. And like IBM, HP is moving into cloud computing, although as Michael Copeland pointed out, HP will focus further down the food chain, leaving the high-end to companies with more established cloud offerings like Oracle (ORCL) and, ahem, IBM.

????In his presentation, Apotheker spoke as if he believed that HP's access to end users would give it an advantage over IBM, as if 100 million webOS-powered devices will somehow draw consumers and companies into HP's cloud offerings. But it's not clear that will happen: The cloud is almost by definition independent of the operating software running devices that connect to it. Amazon (AMZN) has built a successful cloud business, Amazon Web Services, without caring which OS devices are running.

????But IBM is already taking big steps into the "mid-level" cloud, too. It recently announced its own plan to build a public cloud, and this week it said it's investing $38 million in a cloud computing data center in Singapore. Earlier this month, IBM told investors it plans to see $7 billion in revenue from cloud services by 2015. It may be that IBM is closer to the proverbial puck than HP.

????So it's not surprising that, on the eve of HP's shareholder meeting this week, a top IBM executive sniffed that his company was "years ahead" of HP when it came to building an integrated software and services provider.

????By contrast, in interviews following the meeting, Apotheker seemed on the defensive. The New York Times quoted him saying, "We are not playing catch-up to anyone, particularly IBM." And when an Infoworld editor noted that HP's portfolio "seems to overlap almost 100% with what IBM is doing," Apotheker replied testily, "I would qualify it slightly differently: IBM overlaps 100% with us."

????In the end, such verbal sniping means little. Rivalries are settled in the market, and if HP can beat IBM at its own game, it will silence its critics. For now, though, HP will have to prove itself in IBM's shadow.