Getting the Stuff Out of the Garage

Hewlett-Packard will announce a new strategy for HP Labs Thursday 6 March. One challenge for the corporate research facility:
Get innovations out of the lab and into customers’ hands

They Labs were founded in 1962, at a time when founders Bill Hewlett and David Packard still ran the company; a time when HP was radically different from the printer and personal computer company it is today.

Last August the labs got a new director, Prith Banerjee. In an interview made when he had been three months on the job, he pointed out the transfer of technology from the lab to HP’s business units as one big challenge.

That will probably be the main theme tomorrow Thursday, when CEO Mark Hurd will announce the new directions for the corporate research facility.

HP Labs has met the same criticism as Xerox Parc and Bell Labs: The research is excellent, but it has not consistently translated into commercial products. The question is, how does a personal computer maker benefit from advanced nanotechnology research?

Several other high-tech companies have broken up their labs and transferred all R&D to the separate business divisions, in order to bridge the gap between research and product development.

However, the HP management will likely keep the labs as a central corporate facility, according to industry watcher Tim Bajarin:
”Basically, the reason why Mark Hurd will be there tomorrow is to reinforce the importance of the HP Labs. They have been an important part of HP’s strategy for decades.”

”What we are talking about is not a reorganization, more of clarifying the vision for the labs. How they can make their work more relevant to customers demands today.”

In other words:
If you don’t get your products out of the garage, you wont have anything to sell.