Rating: 
Summary: A Reporter's Eye with a Thriller's Pace
Review: "Backfire", Peter Burrows' remarkable chronicle of Hewlett-Packard's controversial acquisition of Compaq, marks an important milestone in the rich technology heritage of Silicon Valley. "Backfire" is far more ambitious than the pabulum typical of business writings. In order to build a cogent thesis, Burrows takes on a broad range of topics, including pertinent biographical background of the key players, the legend and lore of Hewlett Packard - the company and the founders - and the arcane mechanics of proxy votes and corporate government. But while the subject matter risks could easily yield a pompous and boring analytical tome, the author injects exactly the right amount of intrigue, drama, treachery, and humor while capturing characters that are wholly believable in their flaws, foibles, and ultimate victory or defeat. The economy of Burrows' prose, sharpened by years of reporting for "Business Week", yields a tale that is a true page-turner with much more energy, excitement, and personality than the standard business fare.Any frequent "Business Week" reader knows that Burrows is no fan of Carly Fiorina. Consequently, the author was not granted official access to either Fiorina or HP officials (HP denies any connection, citing only "scheduling conflicts"). Notwithstanding, his portrayal of HP's embattled CEO is vivid and wholly believable. Fiorina, the marketer and master-of-spin with no prior CEO experience, is injected into the venerable but stumbling culture of Hewlett-Packard. A veteran of the politics and bureaucracy of AT&T and Lucent, she is an unusual match for the techno-nerd culture of HP, where products trump hype and integrity and loyalty are revered. But while Burrows' criticism of Fiorina is biting and unrestrained, due credit is given to her tenacity, oratory skills, and relentless dedication to completing the acquisition at all costs. Walter Hewlett, who rises from a coccon academic obscurity to fight-the-good-fight is treated much more charitably, but he only barely qualifies as the hero of the tale. While recognozed for his honor and integrity in refusing to allow the proxy fight to deteriorate into personal attacks on Fiorina, his actions and judgment as a board member in the weeks and months prior to the planned merger's announcement are rightfully questioned. If there is a villain in the story, it is HP's board of directors. It is the board that passively watched while HP failed to capitalize on the rise of the Internet in the mid-late nineties, allowing HP to degenerate to a position of significance only in its printers. It was the board that initiated a bizarre, if not amateurish, CEO search leaving Fiorina as virtually the only real candidate for this high-profile job. Much is made of the demise of the celebrated "HP Way". But Burrows wisely resists the temptation to attribute all of the responsibility for this decline on Fiorina. While it is successfully argued that she failed to grasp the true significance of this unique culture, further alienating frustrated employees, by the time Fiorina arrived on the scene it was already in steep decline. What was once an honored tradition of mutual respect and pride in innovation had been replaced by a sense of entitlement and an excuse for sloth. It is unfortunate, Burrows notes, than in the age of Enron and WorldCom, with corporate America in desperate need of the principals and values that embodied the "HP Way", that there is little chance of resuscitation under Fiorina's reign. In summary, "Backfire" is a masterful portrayal of the rise-and-fall of an American icon, and a revealing exposé for the behind-the-scenes machinations of history's largest technology merger and ugliest proxy fight. It is a must read for anyone interested in the history of Silicon Valley, executive leadership, corporate governance, or corporate culture. In the subsequent dissections of the HP/Compaq post-merger failures (or, less likely, successes) that are sure to come over the next several years, Peter Burrows' "Backfire" will serve as a frequently quoted and pivotal reference point.
Rating: 
Summary: A page-turner
Review: A surprisingly gripping story of what happened when the old-fashioned way of doing business met the "new" way. I don't normally follow tech topics, but picked this book up for a business ethics class. I was halfway through before I realized it. Burrows combines a lot of information into a driving narrative. The result is a very readable, very informative examination of modern business ethics, such as they are. The account of Fiorina's transformation from medieval scholar to calculating business executive is particularly chilling. I'll be following what becomes of HP with interest.
Rating:
Summary: A Really Good Read
Review: After reading the piece in the Chicago Sun Times, I wanted to know more about the subject and felt this book really shed some new light into the real "Carlton Sneed Fiorina". I also felt the author was credible in his reporting being from BusinessWeek and all. I really like the way the author captures the drama of the proxy fight and the characters involved from both sides. I felt like I was a fly on the wall.
Rating:
Summary: Read all about greedy & creepy Carly
Review: Great book. Gets you behind the scenes of what really happended and how Carly wrecked HP and overpaid for Compaq. I used to be a decent small corporate customer of HP. We bought their servers, desktops, printers, monitors, hubs & switches, calculators, great hard drives (when they were making them) plus other stuff. HP always had great engineering. After what she has done to HP - I cannot in good conscience ever buy any new HP gear except maybe their laser printers. Carly has wrecked HP. The people on the board who decided to hire her must have been .... She left wonderful Lucent just before it crashed and before the cooked books and other things were disclosed. The only guy still trying to manage a company the old "HP way" (where you care about the employees) in Silicon Valley is Scott McNealey at Sun. Carly is a disaster. Please note this is not a rant about women managers. There are plenty of very good women managers but Carly is not one of them. If you want to learn how one greedy person wrecked one of the greatest American corporations - read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Computer server business assessment needed in book
Review: I enjoyed this book as it contained substantial original reporting that is not duplicative of the work that others have done. I would have liked to see more material concerning bottom line issues. The bottom line issue that has the most resonance for me is the Wall Street assessment, both now, and at the time of the merger, that HP's non-printing businesses have no value on the Street. In other words, if HP were to be bought by some other firm, the Wall Street consensus is that such an acquirer should simply eliminate the other businesses. HP's value is actually less as currently structured because eliminating these other businesses has closing costs associated with this shutdown activity. The clear implication here is that Walter Hewlett was absolutely correct in opposing this merger, since the result clearly is that 20 billion dollars was completely wasted, and precious time is still being lost on ineffective strategies to revive these businesses. With the benefit of hindsight we can say that Walter Hewlett should have been given more credit than he received, even from Burrows, for opposing this capital and job destruction, even in the face of Fiorina's personal attacks. This book should have pointed out that these at-risk businesses can still be saved, particularly the server and server-related businesses, with the appointment of proper management by the Board of Directors. What they need to be looking for this time is not someone whose picture has been on the cover of "Fortune" magazine, as was Carly's before she was hired, but someone with the knowledge and interest in saving HP. Carly not only does not have the engineering expertise, she simply creates the impression that she has no interest in HP's existing businesses, even printing, which she has left to wither on the vine in a new investment sense. HP has had a computer server business for over 25 years. It is a big market, roughly 50 billion yearly and rising. HP has 27%, but has failed to gain any share at all from the collapse of Sun Microsystems. Instead, customers are transfering to IBM and Dell, which should be a big wake-up call for the Board. Dell Computer is number one in market position for the key Linux server business, perhaps because of HP's totally insular and uninformed approach to this market. A lot of hard work by HP employees went into building a formerly successful server business, it is senseless to discard this potentially excellent business because Carly is more interested in trying to sell MP3s at Starbucks, something that will never generate much profit. I would have liked to have seen a clear statement in this book that if in the summer of 2004 if HP's non-printer businesses are still worth zero, that the HP Board of Directors needs hire a new CEO. Doubtless they prefer to have a charming dialogue with Carly about her boneheaded hipster ideas involving HP products in Starbucks rather than argue with some computer nerd about computer enterprise/service-provider product investments, but I would argue that being true to their responsibilities requires that they do the later, whether they like it or not. It would have been good for Burrows' book to say so.
Rating:
Summary: Computer server business assessment needed in book
Review: I enjoyed this book as it contained substantial original reporting that is not duplicative of the work that others have done. I would have liked to see more material concerning bottom line issues. The bottom line issue that has the most resonance for me is the Wall Street assessment, both now, and at the time of the merger, that HP's non-printing businesses have no value on the Street. In other words, if HP were to be bought by some other firm, the Wall Street consensus is that such an acquirer should simply eliminate the other businesses. HP's value is actually less as currently structured because eliminating these other businesses has closing costs associated with this shutdown activity. The clear implication here is that Walter Hewlett was absolutely correct in opposing this merger, since the result clearly is that 20 billion dollars was completely wasted, and precious time is still being lost on ineffective strategies to revive these businesses. With the benefit of hindsight we can say that Walter Hewlett should have been given more credit than he received, even from Burrows, for opposing this capital and job destruction, even in the face of Fiorina's personal attacks. This book should have pointed out that these at-risk businesses can still be saved, particularly the server and server-related businesses, with the appointment of proper management by the Board of Directors. What they need to be looking for this time is not someone whose picture has been on the cover of "Fortune" magazine, as was Carly's before she was hired, but someone with the knowledge and interest in saving HP. Carly not only does not have the engineering expertise, she simply creates the impression that she has no interest in HP's existing businesses, even printing, which she has left to wither on the vine in a new investment sense. HP has had a computer server business for over 25 years. It is a big market, roughly 50 billion yearly and rising. HP has 27%, but has failed to gain any share at all from the collapse of Sun Microsystems. Instead, customers are transfering to IBM and Dell, which should be a big wake-up call for the Board. Dell Computer is number one in market position for the key Linux server business, perhaps because of HP's totally insular and uninformed approach to this market. A lot of hard work by HP employees went into building a formerly successful server business, it is senseless to discard this potentially excellent business because Carly is more interested in trying to sell MP3s at Starbucks, something that will never generate much profit. I would have liked to have seen a clear statement in this book that if in the summer of 2004 if HP's non-printer businesses are still worth zero, that the HP Board of Directors needs hire a new CEO. Doubtless they prefer to have a charming dialogue with Carly about her boneheaded hipster ideas involving HP products in Starbucks rather than argue with some computer nerd about computer enterprise/service-provider product investments, but I would argue that being true to their responsibilities requires that they do the later, whether they like it or not. It would have been good for Burrows' book to say so.
Rating:
Summary: He didn't have to drink the kool aid
Review: In addition to being a compelling, insightful account of the merger announcement and ensuing proxy fight, Backfire gives a wonderful glimpse into the heart and soul of the most powerful woman in American business. Especially when it comes to the Lucent anecdotes and the revealing moments after she first arrived at HP, Burrows provides a rich tapestry of insight and examples that allow you to truly get your mind around (and inside) what makes Carly tick.
With a wealth of interview material to draw from obtained prior to the HP's decision to freeze him out, what this tome does without compromise is maintain its sense of impartial perspective -- a never wavering eye on the events of the past and present. No deal had to be struck and no compromises made in order to deliver this saga, and it is far more fascinating, honest, and revealing without those concessions.
Rating: 
Summary: Biased Reporting from Burrows
Review: It is clear that Burrows wrote this book to make Carly Fiorina look as bad as he possibly could. There simply is no balanced reporting here. This is a hatchet job from beginning to end and not work the time it took to read it.
Rating:
Summary: A poorly written story that just does not hold up
Review: It is clear that this book was rushed through to follow onto some of the sensational headlines of the HP/Compaq acquistion battle. The story is so spotty and incomplete that it is apparent that the author must not have had time to do his homework for the book. Also, I wonder what kind of editor rushed this book to press. I found several blatant inconsistencies and contradictions of the facts presented in the book(like where Carly was working at certain times). It is a shame that people will probably read this and take it to be the truth.
Rating: 
Summary: Fiorina's harmful international impact ignored
Review: My major concern with this book is that it vastly understates the negative impacts any poor HP CEO, and in particular Carly Fiorina, can have. The negative impacts are not limited to HP shareholders, employees and customers, whom few people seem to care about. A few months ago Fiorina bought a 10,000 person Indian software firm, adding greatly to HP's huge investment in India. Inappropriate investments, HP and otherwise, are greatly resented in India, because it reinforces corruption in the culture that prevents improved living conditions for most Indians. Your Ronald Reagan dealt with the corrupt culture in the Soviet Union in a vastly superior way -- not by financially supporting corrupt bureaucrats and communist state governments (as Fiorina has done in India) but by dealing very sternly with these malfactors. Fiorina's investments have caused great harm in India. A few days ago Atal Vajpayee's government was voted out and the communists are going to call many of the shots in the new government. This is very, very bad for about a billion Indians. These potential international impacts should have been given attention in Burrows book. HP and a few other big US firms caused this senseless suffering in pursuit of corruption in India. The motivation for HP to outsource to India in the way they are doing it is certainly not cost savings (which don't really exist) -- the motivation is a combination of graft (doing business in India requires bribes, and once slush funds are created it is impossible to determine weather the bribes really go to Indian bureaucrats or whether American managers pocket most of the cash) and the desire of Carly to remove herself as far from actual production and productive people as possible. It is said she does not even use the company cafeteria because she could find herself too close to actual HP workers. I would hope in the future America would produce more great leaders like Ronald Reagan and find ways to keep harmful ditzy people like Carly Fiorina out of leadership positions. Burrows book would have been much better with a discussion of these international impacts.
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