MacBook Pros Conspicuous at HP Meeting

Apple MacBook Pros were conspicuous at a recent Hewlett-Packard analyst meeting and one caught the eye of CEO Mark Hurd. This was reported by Arik Hesseldahl in his Business Week Blog on Tuesday.

Mr. Hesseldahl was sitting behind four people from Soleil-Cross Research, and three of them were taking notes on a MacBook Pro. This struck him as unusual since he had been accustomed to seeing only PC notebooks in these meetings. Later, when another analyst posed a question to Mark Hurd, the HP CEO saw the Apple and said, ""That notebook youive got there is a challenge to us...""

The Blog continued, noting that the users of the MacBook Pros seemed to be using "a very slick-looking Java-based Reuters terminal application. From where I sat, I could see all three of these MacBook-carrying analysts were very busy and very productive...with not a single Windows application needed."

Mr. Hesseldahl chatted with one of the analysts after the meeting and asked her about her use of a MacBook: ""My problem isnit with HP notebooks," she said. "Itis with Microsoft.""

The author didnit draw any conclusions from this incident. In recounting the decisions of other industry analysts, all that needed to be said was said in his low-key yet telling Blog entry.