Once again, sudden developments out of HP left Wall Street stunned. This time the tech titan confounded investors with their replacement for Mark Hurd.

Despite chatter that the board would go with an internal candidate, in the end the tech titan went outside the company.

And not with Steve Mills from IBM or even Mike Capellas formerly of Compaq, the two rumored front runners among the external candidates. Instead they named  Leo Apotheker as the new chief executive officer.