Goodwill

6 Months Ended

Apr. 30, 2021

Goodwill and Intangible Assets Disclosure [Abstract]

The following table represents the carrying value of goodwill, by reportable segment as of October 31, 2020 and April 30, 2021:


	Compute		HPC & MCS		Storage		Intelligent Edge		Financial Services		Corporate Investments and Other		Total
	In millions



Balance at October 31, 2020 and April 30, 2021 (1) (2)	$	7,532	$	3,616	$	3,946	$	2,566	$	144	$	213	$	18,017

(1)As a result of the organizational realignments which were effective as of November 1, 2020, (described in Note 1, "Overview and Summary of Significant Accounting Policies"), $213 million of goodwill was reallocated from Storage segment to Corporate Investments and Other segment as of the beginning of the period using a relative fair value approach.

(2)Goodwill is net of accumulated impairment losses of $953 million. Of this amount, $865 million related to the HPC & MCS reporting unit was recorded during the second quarter of 2020 and $88 million related to the CMS reporting unit within Corporate Investments and Other was recorded during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2018. There is no goodwill remaining in the CMS reporting unit.

Effective at the beginning of the first quarter of fiscal 2021, the Company's operations were realigned into six segments for financial reporting purposes. The Company's reporting units containing goodwill are consistent with the reportable segments identified in Note 2, "Segment Information" with the exception of Corporate Investments and Other which is made up of three reporting units, A & PS, CMS, and Software, of which only Software has goodwill. As a result of this realignment, the Company performed an interim quantitative goodwill impairment test for all of its reporting units as of November 1, 2020, which did not result in any goodwill impairment charges. The fair value of all reporting units continued to exceed the carrying value of their net assets. The excess of fair value over carrying value for our reporting units ranged from approximately 8% to 37% of the respective carrying values. In order to evaluate the sensitivity of the estimated fair value of our reporting units in the goodwill impairment test, the Company applied a hypothetical 10% decrease to the fair value of each reporting unit. Based on the results of this hypothetical 10% decrease all of the reporting units had an excess of fair value over carrying value, with the exception of HPC & MCS reporting unit.

As of the interim test date, the HPC & MCS reporting unit has goodwill of $3.6 billion and an excess of fair value over carrying value of net assets of 8%. The fair value of the HPC & MCS reporting unit was based on a weighting of fair values derived most significantly from the income approach, and to a lesser extent, the market approach. The HPC & MCS business is facing challenges on the current and projected future results as the revenue growth is dependent on timing of delivery and related achievement of customer acceptance milestones. If the Company is not successful in addressing these challenges, the projected revenue growth rates or operating margins could decline resulting in a decrease in the fair value of the HPC & MCS reporting unit. The fair value of the HPC & MCS reporting unit could also be negatively impacted by changes in its weighted average cost of capital, changes in management's business strategy or significant and sustained declines in the stock price, which could result in an indicator of impairment.

In addition, should economic conditions deteriorate, estimates of future cash flows for each of the Company's reporting units may be insufficient to support the carrying value and the goodwill assigned to them, requiring impairment charges. Further impairment charges, if any, may be material to the results of operations and financial position.

The Company will continue to evaluate the recoverability of goodwill on an annual basis as of the beginning of its fourth fiscal quarter and whenever events or changes in circumstances indicate there may be a potential impairment.