HP exec admits Microsoft borked their HP Elite X3 plans

In what many called fake news, we recently passed on a report from 2 independent sources that HP would soon cease sales of the HP Elite X3.

Then HP denied the rumour, and in an official statement said:

HP is always responding to customer feedback to deliver the best product experiences. We remain committed to our mobility strategy and vision and will sell the Elite x3 through 2019 while continuing to enhance our portfolio delivering multi-OS devices, accessories and workflow transformation solutions. Mobility is an exciting and rapidly evolving area, and HP will continue to explore ways to address our customers’ mobile computing needs.

Now, at the Canalys Channels Forum an HP executive has gone on record and admitted their HP Elite X3 plans have changed.

Nick Lazaridis, HP’s EMEA President, told The Register that they were cutting short their proposed HP Elite X3 roadmap due to  Microsoft’s “change of strategy” with its mobile OS.

“Microsoft, as all companies do, decided on a change in strategy and so they are less focused on what they thought they would be focused on today,” he said.

Lazaridis said Microsoft had confirmed there will be no further development work on the mobile OS.

“Given that, we also had decided that without Microsoft’s drive and support there it doesn’t make sense. If the software, if the operating system ecosystem isn’t there then we are not an operating system company.”

HP Inc had a full roadmap for the device. “X3 was going to bifurcate, there were going to be a number of products,” said the exec.

HP has shown off a mid-range successor to the HP Elite X3 and an improved lapdock at Mobile World Congress 2017 .

Instead, sales and support for the 2016 handset will continue only “until 2019”.

While HP did say sales would continue until 2019 but Lazaridis confirmed that HP Inc did not have large stockpiles of the handset and that X3 sales would be limited to customers with “large bids and opportunities”.