The Zacks Analyst Blog Highlights: Hewlett-Packard, Amazon.com, IBM, Google and Salesforce.com

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – March 19, 2012 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include Hewlett-Packard Company ( (HPQ - Analyst Report), Amazon.com Inc. ( (AMZN - Analyst Report), IBM Corp. ( (IBM - Analyst Report), Google Inc. ( (GOOG - Analyst Report) and Salesforce.com Inc. ( (CRM - Analyst Report).

Get the most recent insight from Zacks Equity Research with the free Profit from the Pros newsletter: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5513

Here are highlights from Friday’s Analyst Blog:

H-P Cloud Apps to Air Shortly

After a long wait, Palo-Alto based tech behemoth Hewlett-Packard Company ( (HPQ - Analyst Report) decided to make its cloud computing services public with its second quarter results. The announcement was made by an internal source to New York Times magazine. The announcement was in sync with H-P’s intention to shift its focus on the higher-margin cloud computing arena.

As per the internal executive’s statement, H-P is about to air its cloud services, which are expected to be similar to the cloud platform offered by renowned online retailer Amazon.com Inc.’s ( (AMZN - Analyst Report) Web Services.

Amazon.com operates as an online retailer internationally. Additionally, the company serves developers through Amazon Web Services (AWS), which provides access to technology infrastructure that developers can use to enable various types of virtual businesses. All services over AWS are billed on usage, but how the usage is measured for billing varies from service to service.

H-P assured that it will not be competing over prices, but plans to provide structured and unstructured databases and data analytics as a service. These services were inherited from Autonomy Corp., which was acquired in August 2011 for a handsome consideration of $10.3 billion. With Autonomy, H-P became a strong contender in the $55.0 billion business analytics software and services market.

Though H-P down not intends to fight over prices, its services could face stiff competition, going forward. Amazon is planning to launch an unstructured "noSQL" database as a service, while IBM Corp. ( (IBM - Analyst Report) is dealing with various analytics services in the cloud.

Apart from this, the H-P cloud will offer some programming languages such as Ruby, Java and PHP. In this respect, the tech giant would be up against Google Inc. ( (GOOG - Analyst Report) and Salesforce.com Inc. ( (CRM - Analyst Report).

Shifting focus from the traditional low-margin PC business to the high-margin storage and cloud computing business has become critical to H-P’s success. H-P’s effort was apparent from its two most pricey acquisitions. The company took over storage vendor 3Par Inc. at a hefty $2.35 billion. The second purchase was that of Autonomy, a smaller software company.

3Par was a perfect fit for H-P’s Converged Infrastructure portfolio, which brings together servers, storage and networking products to manage data centers from a common platform and ultimately help to transform an organization’s IT into the cloud.

H-P’s cloud infrastructure is popular among its customers. But its software- as-a-service offering may take some time to ramp, as it will be first used by the existing customers.

H-P’s venture is encouraging but it will take some time to take off. This apart, lackluster PC demand and Meg Whitman’s yet-to-be proven strategies keep us on the sidelines.

Currently, H-P has a Zacks #3 Rank, implying a short-term Hold recommendation.

Want more from Zacks Equity Research? Subscribe to the free Profit from the Pros newsletter: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5515.

About Zacks Equity Research

Zacks Equity Research provides the best of quantitative and qualitative analysis to help investors know what stocks to buy and which to sell for the long-term.

Continuous coverage is provided for a universe of 1,150 publicly traded stocks. Our analysts are organized by industry which gives them keen insights to developments that affect company profits and stock performance. Recommendations and target prices are six-month time horizons.

Zacks "Profit from the Pros" e-mail newsletter provides highlights of the latest analysis from Zacks Equity Research. Subscribe to this free newsletter today: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5517

About Zacks

Zacks.com is a property of Zacks Investment Research, Inc., which was formed in 1978 by Leon Zacks. As a PhD from MIT Len knew he could find patterns in stock market data that would lead to superior investment results. Amongst his many accomplishments was the formation of his proprietary stock picking system; the Zacks Rank, which continues to outperform the market by nearly a 3 to 1 margin. The best way to unlock the profitable stock recommendations and market insights of Zacks Investment Research is through our free daily email newsletter; Profit from the Pros. In short, it's your steady flow of Profitable ideas GUARANTEED to be worth your time! Register for your free subscription to Profit from the Pros at http://at.zacks.com/?id=5518.

Visit http://www.zacks.com/performance for information about the performance numbers displayed in this press release.

Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/zacksresearch

Join us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Zacks-Investment-Research/57553657748?ref=ts

Disclaimer: Past performance does not guarantee future results. Investors should always research companies and securities before making any investments. Nothing herein should be construed as an offer or solicitation to buy or sell any security.

Media Contact
Zacks Investment Research
800-767-3771 ext. 9339
support@zacks.com
http://www.zacks.com