HP gains control of Autonomy

NEW YORK: Hewlett-Packard said Monday that it has closed its $10.24 billion purchase of British software company Autonomy, a deal which contributed to the downfall of former HP chief executive Leo Apotheker.

The Palo Alto, California-based HP said 87.34 percent of the stockholders of Autonomy had approved the offer for the company made in August.

"As such, all conditions relating to the offer have now been satisfied, allowing HP to acquire control of Autonomy," HP said in a statement.

The Autonomy acquisition positions HP as a "leader in the large and growing enterprise information management space," HP said.

"We are committed to helping our customers solve their toughest IT challenges," HP's new chief executive, Meg Whitman, said in a statement.

"The exploding growth of unstructured and structured data and unlocking its value is the single largest opportunity for consumers, businesses and governments," Whitman said.

"Autonomy significantly increases our capabilities to manage and extract meaning from that data to drive insight, foresight and better decision making," she said.

Whitman, the former chief executive of eBay, replaced Apotheker as CEO of HP last month. Apotheker was removed by the board after less than 11 months at the helm.

Apotheker announced the Autonomy acquisition in August as part of a strategic shift by the world's top personal computer maker that also included a possible spinoff of its PC unit.

HP shares plunged 20 percent the next day and lost 40 percent of their value during Apotheker's tenure.

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011