A court trial in which Hewlett-Packard director Walter Hewlett
challenged a vote in favour of HP's merger with Compaq Computer has
been adjourned. A ruling is expected imminently from the judge who
presided over the three-day proceedings.
There were no closing remarks and Judge William Chandler III said
he understood the time constraints in the case, referring to HP's
plan to launch the merger on 7 May and the fact that HP is holding
its annual meeting today (26 May) in California. He said he would
have a decision as soon as possible.
The final witness in the case was Boeing chairman and chief
executive Phil Condit who is also an HP director. Condit further
bolstered HP's claims that documents questioned by Walter Hewlett
were planning estimates and were not needed by the board or
shareholders in making a decision on the merger. Hewlett's lawyer
suggested that the documents, prepared by middle managers from HP
and Compaq, were kept from shareholders because they predicted
overly pessimistic financial results if the companies should merge.
Earlier in the day, HP chair and chief executive Carly Fiorina was
again called to testify on a conference call between HP and
officials of Deutsche Bank. During the trial, Hewlett's lawyer
tried to show that HP pressured Deutsche Bank to switch millions of
votes to favour the merger. Fiorina denied that any pressure was
exerted on Deutsche Bank to support the merger.