Hewlett-Packard Co. offered a rosy financial outlook Tuesday without giving any guidance on the biggest issue hanging over the world’s largest technology company: the identity of its next CEO.
The leading maker of personal computers and printers has been looking for a new leader since its board pressured Mark Hurd, its CEO of five years, to step down in an early August scandal revolving around allegations of sexual harassment and deceptive expense reports.
Although HP didn’t shed any light on its CEO search at Tuesday’s analyst meeting, its current executives left little doubt that they believe the company will prosper no matter who is at the helm.
The company’s interim CEO, Cathie Lesjak, told analysts HP’s per-share earnings for its fiscal year ending in October 2011 will range from $5.05 to $5.15, excluding certain accounting items related to its recent acquisition spree. That would be up by as much as 14 percent from this year and ahead of the average estimate of $4.99 per share among analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.
Next year’s revenue is expected to total $131.5 billion to $133.5 billion, an increase of 5 percent to 7 percent. Analysts were looking for $131.4 billion in revenue.
The projections reflect HP’s confidence that it can boost profit margins as it expands into consulting services, computer security and storage while maintaining its lead in PCs and printers. The company also expects to keep grabbing market share through acquisitions, having already spent about $31 billion buying 35 companies during the past four years.
One of those recent acquisitions, Palm Inc., will provide the operating system for a computer tablet that HP plans to introduce next year to compete against Apple Inc.’s popular iPad. HP spent $1.8 billion to snap up the long-struggling Palm while Hurd was still CEO.
Until he was forced out, Hurd had delighted Wall…