Hewlett-Packard, the world’s largest computer manufacturer, turned heads this week as they announced one shocker after another.

The calm before the storm

At the beginning of the week, HP announced that it will soon launch its smartphone, Pre 3, in the UK soon, to be carried by Orange.  The device will be equipped with a 1.2GHz dual-core processor, which isn’t too much of a shocker at this point.  After that, reports came out how the company intends to improve upon big data service through updating their mapping software so companies can easily track systems, applications and processes to run their systems efficiently.

We then heard that, aside from PCs and mobile devices, they plan on incorporating their webOS on home appliances and automobiles in a move to make everything in one’s life more integrated.  So far, HP has made plans on improving itself, with ongoing developments that promote webOS amongst other things, lining up the days prior to its earnings call.

HP dropping bombs

But as the week draws to an end, they decided to drop the bombs.  The company confirmed that it is in talks with Autonomy for a possible acquisition.  Concerns started pouring as Autonomy is a software company, leaving us to wonder what will happen to webOS?  But the biggest shocker of all is their announcement, during their earnings call, that they will stop shipping webOS devices, which aren’t doing so well in the market.  This could mean that Palm, the company that originally made the OS which HP acquired, ending a short-lived era.  HP’s been shifting its focus away from hardware to software in many regards, but the mobile sector is still full of promise.  The company did indicate its intentions to continually pursue outlets for its webOS platform, but will cease production of its own devices to run the software.

But that hasn’t kept pundits from analyzing the deal from an array of perspectives.  Since patents are a hot commodity these days, HP could actually sell Palm’s patents for a hefty price as their patents could be the one that can withstand Apple’s never ending string of infringement lawsuits against different companies.   Apple never took Palm to court and Palm believes that it is because they can countersue, as Apple seemed to have taken a few pages out of their book.  One company that could be interested, if ever Palm becomes available in the market could be Google, since it’s so into patent buys these days.

HP’s announcements will greatly affect the industry as questions are starting to surface as to what will happen to the computer hardware industry if they do decide to stop producing them?  Will they still push through with their webOS plan of making it available for appliances and automobiles?  Will they sell Palm?  Will they really buy Autonomy?  Should investors be worried?  Does this mean workers will be laid-off?  These are just some of the questions going through the minds of people, and these are the questions that HP should address in the coming days or they might soon find their investors abandoning ship.