I bet Michael Dell is wishing he never made that comment about Apple doing this all those years ago.
I bet Michael Dell is wishing he never made that comment about Apple doing this all those years ago.
It is doubtful this is about "making" Dell do more or less Linux stuff. Dell is heavily positioned toward making a dent in the server market. That means Linux (along with Windows) or it means losing. I don't think Microsoft is out to loose $2B.
"What would I do? I'd shut [Apple] down and give the money back to the shareholders," Michael Dell said before a crowd of several thousand IT executives.
Dell has had Linux/bare metal offerings for years. [...]
There is no such thing as the post-PC era. Anyone who believes that doesn't understand computers. It's not that people don't want or need computers but rather the fact that computing power has increased to the point where upgrade cycles are extremely long now. That is the reason for the sales slump the market has been in.
Gone are the days where upgrades provide dramatic performance improvements. The PC boom was happening when the internet was the driving force for those upgrades. An 5-8 year old computer is enough for what the vast majority of people do with one today.
These incremental upgrades are going to catch up to the phone and tablet market too in a few years and people are not going to need them as often. A few years after that the second hand market will be flooded with completely capable cheap devices and those markets will slump as well.
Dell has had Linux/bare metal offerings for years. ...
That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. Relative levels of promotion, not abandoning Linux altogether.
I really don't want to see people lose their Dell jobs, especially in this market. However, it is great to see Michael Dell eating crow in this case!
I bet Michael Dell is wishing he never made that comment about Apple doing this all those years ago.
Dell said that he initially refused to answer the original question in 1997, and after being asked to answer twice he basically responded What would I do? Id shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders, because he couldnt imagine himself being CEO of any other company.
Dell went on, The meaning of my answer was that Im the CEO of Dell, I dont think about being the CEO of any other company, Im not a CEO for hire, so if you asked me what Id do for any other company, its not really something I think about.
It's too bad Jobs isn't still around to mass email this info to all employees.
This is worth a moment of reflection today.
"I'd shut the company down and give the money back to the shareholders."
15 years later, Dell finally acted on his own advice.
Yeah, I remember when he said that about Apple. Hehehehe. Payback's a bitch.
Steve Jobs beat Michael Dell from the grave. I am so happy on so many levels, one of them being I hate Michael Dell and his right-wing politics.
I bet he isn't. He never meant it in the literal sense, although, that is what everyone took it as at the time.
http://techcrunch.com/2011/10/18/mi...own-quote-my-answer-was-largely-misconstrued/
Dude is still a millionaire, but take your laughs where you must.
I had one of those old beige Dells too. I ended up trading it for a Compaq something or other and then an iMac. My brother had the same ok Dell as me and it is still going at about 13 years old. He finally got a new computer last year but not because the old Dell died. Those old ones were well made.I had a beige Dell something or other... it was a Pentium II. That lasted forever. Was the last Dell I've ever
used that lived past a year old.
I also have a Dell monitor at home. No problems with it.
Agreed. Look at what these "expert" analysts did to Apple's last quarter. Their best EVER quarter by some margin, but because they didn't meet the results these "experts" predicted, they suffered massively negative reporting, and a massive drop in sp/market cap.
It's almost as if these analysts buy shares, over-up the predictions and dump just before announcements.
Hopefully this will allow them to become more innovative and increase competition.
If Apple were to go private today it would be a $550B LBO. Since most shares are not owned by insiders, which is different from Dell, it would be more difficult to go private at all. However it would be possible for Apple and Braeburn to get considerable leverage, both bank and brokerage, buy back its stock in the open market and through dark pools, and make slow progress toward setting up a future go private effort.
If they were to buy back half the company at stock prices of $450-500 at $275B and assuming 4:1 leverage, the cash cost would be only $55B. Pocket change for Apple and Braeburn.
Although today's market cap is only $418B. Only 3x cash in bank.
Rocketman
I bet Michael Dell is wishing he never made that comment about Apple doing this all those years ago.
The Inspiron 15z Ultrabook + Touch, which is the model the closest to the MacBook Pro 15" in terms of hardware, costs about $1400...
Taking the public money to fund the rapid growth phases and then buying it all back once the situation has leveled out. We may start seeing this as more of a trend.
Really a good move for them and MS. Being public in the market today is a lot harder than it once was.
You weren't implying that Dell was selling a laptop equivalent to a 15-inch MacBook Pro for only £400?I dont see your point?