The announcement that Hewlett Packard intends to spinoff their Personal Systems Group has lead to mixed messages emerging from the corporate community.

Tom Bradley, the current VP of HP’s Personal Systems Group, told Reuters in an interview that he expects HP’s PC arm to remain the largest in the world post spin-off and this play will bring the “best value” to HP shareholders.

“Regardless of what happens, we’re the largest PC company in the world,” Bradley emphasized. “We need everybody energized, and while this isn’t business as usual, we need people to go out and sell products every day.”

Bradley also mentioned that selling the PC division outright to a rival like Lenovo or Acer isn’t a desirable alternative as he says “the numbers don’t support that that strategy works.”

In contrast to Bradley’s cautious optimism, Tom Perkins, a former member of the HP Board of Directors says that the company is committing “corporate suicide”.

“I didn’t know there was such a thing as corporate suicide, but now we know that there is,” Perkins told the New York Times in an interview. “It’s just astonishing.”

Perkins joined the HP board in 2001 after the company merged with Compaq. He served as head of research, in addition to having a role as a board member, but resigned in 2006 when it was revealed that HP had been spying on board members to try and determine who was serving as a mole for the press.

Perkins joins a cacophony of voices that have become increasingly critical of current HP CEO Leo Apotheker.  Under Apotheker’s regime HP missed earnings estimates in early 2011, and had to lower them again in May. The firm’s stock has dropped from a high of $53 in early 2010 to a current value of approximately $25.

“H.P. was the epicenter of Silicon Valley, geographically, culturally and historically,” an executive at another tech giant who preferred to go unnamed told the New York Times. “Is there any analogy for an institution so respected that has fallen so far so fast? I can’t think of one.”