Really?
OK so the US courts have found a UK national guilty of fraud. Unfortunately, I'm not surprised, the US have a history of finding someone foreign to blame for a US based catastrophe.
However, even if the CFO did cook the books (and I'm still not convinced) for a business that had approximately US$1bn revenue, surely you would have to cook the books to an astronomical level to justify an US$11bn adjustment and fraud of that magnitude would have stood out like a sore thumb. The type of things that HP are accusing Autonomy of mostly relate to the timing of revenue recognition not something that could generate massive differences.
This just smacks of a smokescreen to deflect the blame away from HP, their due diligence and their subsequent mismanagement (something of which they have a track record). My understanding is that HP had full access to Autonomy's books for months prior to the deal, were a party to much of the decisions in relation to the day to day running of the business and had their own auditors complete the due diligence.
Seems to me, HP paid over the odds in their haste to become a global powerhouse. Once they realised their error, they then scratched round looking for a scapegoat that wasn't HP. They decided that the seller was at fault for painting Autonomy in a good light and it was in no way their responsibility, no siree, nothing to do with them.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
