H.P. Unit Sheds Stepchild Status to Take on Cisco - NYTimes.com

An interesting co-opetition shift; see the full article for more details

Now H.P. is directly attacking Cisco in a bid to capture a larger chunk of the $20 billion market for local area network and wireless switches. “H.P. has declared war,” said Mark Fabbi, a networking analyst at the research firm Gartner. “H.P. has the potential to completely change the dynamics of the networking industry.”

Hewlett-Packard’s strategy with ProCurve — expand revenue and profit by biting into a leader’s lucrative franchise — is vintage Mark Hurd. And it offers some insights into how the company has outperformed its peers financially even as the technology industry faces a global slowdown.

H.P. Unit Sheds Stepchild Status to Take on Cisco - NYTimes.com