Using our time, talent, and technology to address COVID-19

March 26, 2020 | Antonio Neri, President & CEO

CEO Antonio Neri shares an update on how HPE teams are helping customers, partners, and communities

In this article

  • HPE is committed to being a force for good, adapting and addressing the needs and concerns of our customers and partners
  • This week, HPE announced a donation of $50 million in secure connectivity kits to provision pop-up clinics, testing sites and temporary hospital facilities
  • HPE also joined the White House as part of the High Performance Computing consortium to provide researchers with supercomputing software and applications expertise free of charge

 


We are all seeing the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic grow each day.  People all over the world are taking new measures to address their own personal safety and health, families are adjusting to balancing care for children home from school with other obligations, and small businesses are struggling with fewer patrons. Each one of us is having to put plans aside and recalibrate. In the midst of this hardship, what’s inspiring to me is that people across the globe are finding meaningful ways to help.

With the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic evolving every day, I continue to be proud of the way our teams are stepping up for our customers, partners, and communities in this time of global uncertainty. As I shared in my update last week, our response framework focuses on assessing developments, addressing the needs of our people and business operations, and adapting our business activities to help the world tackle this crisis. These principles are central to HPE’s response to COVID-19.

I continue to be proud of the way our teams are stepping up for our customers, partners, and communities in this time of global uncertainty

COVID-19 has now spread to nearly every country in which we operate. My leadership team and I are engaged with our global Crisis Management Team every day to assess developments and to provide guidance for our teams. With more countries enacting “stay at home” orders on a daily basis, our sites in these locations are officially closed. All HPE team members are being asked to work from home until further notice. Exceptions are only being made for team members performing business critical activities, and management approval is required. The safety, health and wellbeing of our team members and their families continues to be our number one priority.

We are doing everything we can to address the needs and concerns of our customers and partners. We are actively working to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on our operations.  Long before COVID-19, we took steps to diversify our supply chain, and we are working closely with more than 200 suppliers to optimize how we build and distribute our products.

While we’re focused on our customers, we’re also committed to being a force for good, using our time, talent, and technology to address COVID-19. Team members from every function and business are stepping up to help our customers, partners and communities – and deliver on our purpose to advance the way people live and work. Here are some examples from the last week:

  • Recognizing that hospitals and first responders are faced with the need for additional networking infrastructure to augment capacity, we are announcing a donation of $50 million in secure connectivity kits for the immediate provisioning of pop-up clinics, testing sites and temporary hospital facilities in the United States and Europe.

  • In addition, to help healthcare organizations get set up quickly, Aruba has created the Airheads Volunteer Corps, a registry of volunteer network engineers ready to assist in the build out of network infrastructures for medical facilities on the front lines of dealing with this pandemic. Since we launched this registry approximately 48 hours ago, almost 200 engineers spanning more than 20 countries have signed up.

  • HPE joined the White House as part of the High Performance Computing consortium, to help tackle the COVID pandemic. We committed to provide supercomputing software and applications expertise free of charge to help researchers port, run, and optimize essential application to combat this pandemic.

  • We are also participating in a technology “SWAT Team” that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has asked to advise and support the state’s response to COVID-19.  Hybrid IT and Aruba managers in the state are serving as on-the-ground leaders for the project, and we are providing pro bono expertise to add greater capacity, scale and speed to the state’s response.

  • In Italy, our team stepped up to help Grandi Navi Veloci (GNV), a ferry company that has converted a ferry into a floating hospital. In less than one week, our Aruba team together with partner Mantero Sistemi, worked overtime to install Wi-Fi on the ship so it can support as many as 400 patients.

I’m so proud of our team’s efforts as we continue to adapt to the challenges that the world faces. While this is a difficult period, I have no doubt we will emerge stronger and ready to help our customers and communities rebuild.

For more information on HPE’s response to COVID-19, please visit the HPE Newsroom.

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