NEW YORK — MIKE Lynch, the British software entrepreneur at the centre of the accounting scandal that has rocked Hewlett-Packard (HP), has admitted to having used some of the practices that led the US company to level charges of accounting irregularities.However, he denied that the methods used by his former company, Autonomy, were illegal or that they justified the $8.8bn of write-downs taken by HP, turning the case into one of the biggest accounting scandals to have hit corporate America.Mr Lynch’s comments came in an unusually detailed public response to allegations of corporate misconduct that have triggered criminal investigations.The Federal Bureau of Investigations has opened an inquiry into the case, according to people familiar with the matter.HP said it had referred the matter to the Serious Fraud Office in the UK and the US’s Securities and Exchange Commission. The scandal erupted on Tuesday when HP said it had found extensive problems in the Autonomy accounts for the two...
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