PC manufacturer turned MSP and cloud provider Dell has reached a deal to sell itself to its founder and some investors, including Microsoft. A publicly traded company for roughly 25 years, this move will allow Dell to likely become more agile in terms of its business dealings now that it no longer will have to comply with SEC and other regulations governing public companies.
Existing shareholders will receive $13.65 per share for their stock. Once the dust settles from this reverse IPO, most of the MSP and cloud universe will turn its attention to figuring out what Dell's next steps might be.
Michael Dell apparently will still be the CEO. Microsoft is taking a $2 billion stake in the company, which will keep it relatively close to Dell in the future; although it is too difficult to see exactly how this relationship will play out in terms of the channel.
No More Wall Street Dance
In my opinion, I believe the biggest change in Dell could come in its strategy. No longer a publicly traded company Dell will not have to play by the rules of Wall Street and produce quarterly results that tend to reshape the way companies behave just in order to hit a particular number to make an analyst happy. Dell now has freedom to use all the various tools and intellectual property it has at its disposal to seek out strategies that are in the best interest of the company and its customers.
More Services
It hasn't exactly been a secret that Dell has been slowly acquiring IT services firms and technologies over the last decade. Acquisitions like SilverBack Technologies (the original MSP RMM platform), Quest Software, Perot Systems, SonicWALL, AppAssure, and many others, have all positioned Dell as a powerful source of IT services and software. Now that it is a free and privately held company, it can put these tools to proper use.
Channel?
Although nothing in the recent press accounts pays much if any attention to Dell's channel intentions, I also have some thoughts about what might be in store for the company. Dell has had some rough patches with the channel in the past. MSPs, in particular, were concerned about what Dell intended to do when it bought SilverBack in 2007. Concerns of channel conflict were the primary source of distrust amongst MSPs.
However, today, I believe Dell has turned a significant corner and is planning a major comeback to the MSP and cloud channel. How do I know? Call it a changing of the wind. Discussions with different team leaders within the Dell family of companies would lead me to believe Dell is realizing how important MSPs are.
Dell needs the MSPs; and quite frankly, MSPs need Dell. With so much intellectual property held under one company, and now with Microsoft as a significant investor, MSPs are going to need the type of innovation Dell can offer.
Only time will tell what actually happens but as of right now, I feel pretty confident that Dell as a private company will be much different than it was as a public interest. If this change does occur, I do believe MSPs will be a direct beneficiary of this move and things could become very interesting throughout the remainder of 2013.
