Dude, Dell goes public again
NEW YORK — Dell is going public once more after a five-year sojourn as a privately held company.
In the $21.7 billion agreement announced Monday, the PC and data storage company is offering to exchange tracking stock for a new class of common shares, simplifying the complex ownership structure that is still held mostly by founder Michael Dell. That tracking stock was created to help Dell finance a $67 billion purchase of data storage company EMC Corp. in 2016, the largest tech takeover ever at the time.
The investment firm Silver Lake and Michael Dell took Dell Technologies private in 2013 as the company struggled, seeking a freer range of movement that comes with more distance from Wall Street and investors.
Dell, like all PC makers, was hit hard then as people shifted from laptops, to tablets and other mobile devices. While private, Dell strengthened its financial position, posting with revenue growth of 19 percent in its most recent quarter. It’s still losing money, half a billion in that same period, but those losses are shrinking.
When going private, Michael Dell said the company was returning to the “entrepreneurial spirit” on which it was founded. Dell, who grew up in Houston, founded the company in his University of Texas dorm room in 1984.
“Unprecedented data growth is fueling the digital era of IT, and we are uniquely positioned with our portfolio of technologies and services to enable the digital, IT, security and workforce transformations of our customers,” Dell said Monday in a prepared statement.
Earlier this year, Dell Technologies said it was undergoing a significant strategic review and might enter the public sphere
again, while potentially buying the rest of business software provider VMware that it didn’t already own.
Michael Dell, who owns 72 percent of the common shares, will remain as chairman and CEO. Silver Lake will keep its 24 percent minority stake.
Dell in its early years focused on commercial clients, but that changed in the late 1990s when it garnered a huge following among techies who desired more options in customizing PCs.
Soon, the Round Rockbased company was slugging it out with Gateway, IBM and Compaq, eventually becoming the largest PC maker in the world while its rivals faltered. “Dude, you’re getting a Dell,” the company’s marketing campaign, blanketed U.S airwaves in 2000.
By the end of the decade, however, Dell was losing market share to competitors in Asia and it was under threat from Google’s Android devices, and the Apple iPad.
Dell has shifted into networking and pursued avenues into artificial intelligence and 5G technology.
Dell closed up 9 percent at $92.70 Monday. VMware, based in Palo Alto, Calif., makes makes virtualization software that helps maximize workloads on servers, as well as cloud and device management tools. VMware rose 10.2 percent to $162.02.