HP backs Android for the enterprise

HP is confident that its Android devices will help reverse its fortunes as consumers and businesses are seeing the benefits of using platforms other than Windows.

Speaking to IT Pro, Todd Bradley, EVP of the printing and personal systems division, named the tablet market as a key growth area for HP, despite the firm playing catchup with the likes of the iPad.

"Our strategy is around products which can consume and create content. The Android ecosystem is clearly strong and gaining momentum. It's broadly appealing for consumers and the [business] segments," he told us at Discover 2013 in Las Vegas.

"Tablet growth in Europe is one of the few consumer electronics segments which has grown, so we're anxious to get at itYou'll see us with more Android announcements as we go through the year."

Despite HP shunning the Windows RT operating system, Bradley said HP has a multi-OS and multi-architecture strategy in place, and Android is a key part of this.

"Big enterprises are segmenting employee bases the same way retailers and we [manufacturers] do.

"If you look at any large enterprise there is a group of employees that can clearly be productive with an Android set of products and how to make those acceptable is something that we're looking at."

However, with Apple and Samsung having benefitted hugely from BYOD policies, Bradley played down the suggestion HP has been slow to react to the trend - despite only just releasing its own Slate 7 Android tablet.

"I'm not sure that BYOD is a trend as opposed to an event. Our focus is far more on working with enterprises to create what we call CYOD choose your own device - where you're helping a large enterprise create a catalogue of products that meet software, applications and most importantly security requirements.

"A lot of the early BYOD implementations have seen very high service and support costs," he added, suggesting that such policies may not be as succesful as they are being made out.