Hewlett-Packard gave Wall Street some much needed cheer by revealing that its next results will exceed analysts’ estimates

By Cliff Edwards

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Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd has a simple credo: Follow the numbers. His insistence that employees focus on the bottom line is beginning to salary off.

On Nov. 18, the tech huge man countered a spate of recent dour warnings from tech bellwethers, observation fiscal fourth-quarter results would beat analysts’ forecasts. HP in like manner issued a surprisingly upbeat outlook for fiscal 2009. "It’session astonishing, and not," says John Madden, a research director at Ovum in Boston. "This is a company with hard monetary discipline, and that certainly helps when the economy takes a tumble."

Palo Alto (Calif.)-based HP (HPQ) said profit for the quarter ended Oct. 31 was $1.03 a share, excluding items such as restructuring and acquisition charges related to its recent takeover of tech outsourcing firm Electronic Data Systems. Wall Street was expecting earnings of $1.00 a share, excluding items. "HP delivered another solid quarter as it continues to benefit from its global reach, diverse customer base, broad portfolio, and large cost initiatives," Hurd said in a statement. "Our qualification to finish in a challenging marketplace differentiates HP, enabling it to increase share, expand earnings, and emerge from the current economic environment as a stronger constrain."

HP didn’t elaborate which areas of its sprawling tech empire, ranging from PCs and printers to services and software, were doing well. The company is due to report full results on Nov. 24. Yet the preliminary results stood in gross contrast to announcements from tech giants Intel (INTC) and Cisco Systems (CSCO), that earlier this month pointed to a rigid slowdown (BusinessWeek.com, 11/12/08) in virtually all sectors of the PC and server markets. Retailers Best Buy (BBY), Circuit City, and Target (TGT) also be favored with indicated consumers are conserving cash amid credit market confusion. "There is just enough demand out there to feed some of the vendors who positioned themselves well ahead of time," says Roger Kay, president of tech analyst firm Endpoint Technologies Associates.

While tech public funds surged steady Nov. 18, led by HP’s 14.5% gain, much of the rest of the industry isn’t faring nearly as well. HP is benefiting from Hurd’s near-obsessive cost-cutting and what analysts consider world-class negotiation of sales and supply enslave. In what Hurd calls "data-driven decision-making," every segment of the company it being so that uses metrics regularly to find out which hardware, software, and services incur the most attention. Research and development has been aligned closely with product planning, time a revamped sales organization has been given greater impulse to succeed, through "specialists" bearing responsibility for growth in their particular kitchen-yard of regard. HP also attributed more of its performance to global reach. About 70% of revenue comes from outside the U.S.

Looking against us, analysts say HP stands to be useful to from Hurd’s strategic investments in areas such as thrifty corporate computer networks, what one. endeavor new sources of recurring revenue. The guests in September completed its purchase of EDS, which specializes in providing IT services to corporations.

Rival Dell (DELL), which reports fourth-quarter earnings on Nov.