HP: developing markets a 'remarkable opportunity'

HP's head of strategic marketing says the corporation has a "remarkable opportunity" to take advantage of low PC penetration in developing markets.

Speaking at the opening of an HP conference in Shanghai attended by TechRadar, Hoffman said HP's opportunity was that countries such as China still have remarkably low PC penetration – in the case of China it's below 200 PCs per thousand people.

"We're here to acknowledge the place of China in terms of the PC market, it's now the largest market in the world – in the projections for 2015, there will be over 650 million people in China online and connected.

"And there's low penetration, meaning there's a remarkable opportunity in China. That growth is going to happen in Brazil, India and emerging geographies in the world as they count for almost all of the growth in the next few years."

"Global PC penetration will top out at 2.3 billion – that's more than a 300 billion dollar market."

• HP launches Spectre XT Ultrabook plus new Envy models

Hoffman indicated that HP wanted to bounce back from the uncertainty of 2011. "As you're aware, we combined our printer and PC division across the world. On a combined revenue basis it's 65 billion dollars, collectively 120 million devices last year, that's more than 4 devices per second."

"Firstly we're about quality – the investments we're making in quality to drive reliability is absolutely [key]. Then there's value - we have the ability to apply our scale to make our technology available to more people around the globe."

Consumer tech in the office

One of HP's favourite themes – and that of other big PC firms -is what it says is the 'consumerisation of IT' – where consumers bring their own devices into the workplace. "you've got people entering the workforce demanding more from their IT products at work," says Jon Solomon, head of HP's Asian business.

"People bring in other devices which have better battery life or is thin and light," added HP's Brian Ma. "Previously IT departments have said go away but now executives are asking for this. The line between consumers and their work is blurring more."

Introducing the new Elitebook Folio, which has a TPM module for business management, Ma said: "Rogue devices are quite a nightmare [for IT departments]. The obvious problem is security and [losing] corporate data is a problem. Then there are the manageability aspects of those devices."