IBM and Dell Outperform Financial Expectations: Will HP?

Computer manufacturers Dell and IBM have both wowed Wall Street recently, but they won’t be the only ones posting stellar results.

Vernon Computer Source’s blogger team is predicting that Hewlett-Packard (HP) may jolt the market with today’s post-market-close financial results.

Part of HP’s success is no doubt due to its specialization of certain tech sectors. For example, it has placed a certain emphasis on its printer and tablet offerings; it was the first company to offer Apple iPad-friendly Air Printers, and also the first to develop a Windows 7-based tablet PC (the HP Slate 500).

In other words, HP is on a roll, and it’s been making some smart moves.

So are the official analysts as optimistic as we are?

According to Wedbush Morgan’s analyst Kaushik Roy, "The corporate refresh cycle is still going strong and we expect HP to benefit from strength in the enterprise as well as commercial refresh cycles. We expect HP to continue to outperform in the next few quarters."

And we can expect HP to continue staying on point with market trends, as it has done lately. Expediently.

HP’s new CEO, Leo Apotheker, recognizes that his company’s more recent success has everything to do with being at the right place at the right time. In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, Apotheker said “We need to fire up our innovation engine and get our products to market faster. It's not that we aren't innovative; it's that it takes too long to get to market."

Vernon Computer Source has had a first-hand experience with the demand Apotheker is referring to. When the HP Slate 500 was released, the phones at Vernon’s Stamford, Conn. branch were ringing off the hook with requests to rent the tablet PC.

HP likely hopes to hit a similar home-run with its next tablet release, the HP TouchPad. Formerly known as the “Topaz” and also formerly known as being advertised under the Palm label, this will be the first WebOS-based tablet on the market.

Engadget’s review of the TouchPad seemed quite favorable, but the real nitty-gritty reviews of this tablet PC will come after it is shipped out to consumers in late March.