HP faces problems in its two way split

Tenniel's illustration of Tweedledum and Tweedledee - Wikimedia CommonsThe decision by HP to split itself into two will have implications for its business in Europe.

That’s according to a number of analysts at the International Data Corporation (IDC).

Earlier this week HP said it would divide itself into HP Enterprise, focusing on the corporate market, and HP Inc, selling PCs and printers.  Both companies will generate revenues of around $57 billion each.

The changes in Europe will impact the two HPs in between six to 18 months and affect channel, volumes, and SME (small to medium enterprises) sectors.

Giorgi Nebuloni, manager of Datacentres at IDC said: “HP will have extra work to do to align its massive customer base between client/printing devices and low end server and storage to keep a coherent approach on discounting and pricing, especially for SME customers.”

Competitors Lenovo and Dell are likely to take advantage of the changes to drag smaller resellers and distributors away from HP products to their own. IDC thinks that in the mid term the split could end up being costly for HP and both HPs will need to keep their eyes peeled in brand new markets like 3D printing and Big Data analytics.