back to article Rumors say Dell again thinking of going private

IT supplier Dell is rumored to be thinking about taking itself private, getting out from under the expectations of Wall Street and going under the thumbs of the private equity firms that would fund the self-acquisition. According to a report at Bloomberg, which claims to have talked to two people "with knowledge of the matter …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Oh for gods sake, there's a lot more to hardware than Apple and Samsung.

    Samsung make some pretty stupid things, poor quality, bad design and breaks easily. They make 2.5" portable hard disks with USB sockets soldered to the hard disk PCB instead of a SATA->USB convertor. So that if your USB socket snaps off (which they do often looking at HDDForums.com) you're screwed and have to solder wires to the PCB to get the data off. If they did what everyone else did then you could stick the HD in an enclosure.

    Not to mention my fathers 3d Samsung TV which is on the 3rd panel now.

    DellSmell and Samdung are probably a good match.

    1. sam bo
      FAIL

      maybe not the only ones.

      "They make 2.5" portable hard disks with USB sockets soldered to the hard disk PCB instead of a SATA->USB convertor. "

      I have a WD drive here with exactly the same set-up, I was appalled when I saw it, as it meant I couldn't swap drives in the enclosure if I wanted to. The upside was the drive including the enclosure was about the same cost as a stand-alone drive anyway.

    2. toadwarrior

      It's probably best they get out of the stock market. The stock market shows no concern over seeing a business set itself up for a long reasonably profitable life. It's all about pumping up companies until they're fucked and then dumping the stock and letting them sit there to die on their own.

      Of course there is more than Apple and Samsung but they're the flavour of the month so if you're not acting exactly like them then investors think you're a bad company. I think stockmarkets need to be regulated more to ensure responsiblity rather than leaving it as legalised gambling under the guise of being useful for the economy.

  2. Tom 35

    Dell have tablets

    They are just overpriced, not very useful Windows tablets.

    Window 8RT

    http://www.dell.com/ca/p/xps-10-tablet/pd.aspx?c=ca&l=en&s=dhs

    Windows 8 (Intel Atom wow netbook with touch for the price of a nice laptop).

    http://www.dell.com/ca/business/p/latitude-10-tablet/pd

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Dell have tablets

      That's exactly why this is good (and very interesting) news.

  3. Lars Silver badge
    Coat

    Why not

    The stock market is all about "short term" a rather dubious friend really.

  4. John Whitehead

    The only just way

    They should close the company down and return the money to the shareholders.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The only just way

      Damn. Beat me to it.

  5. This post has been deleted by its author

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Merger" with Samsung. Great idea. Snowball's chance in hell.

    I agree Samsung and Dell look like an excellent fit but I can't see the US economic protectionism authorities EVER permitting Samsung to buy Dell. Isn't a "real merger" something of an "urban myth"? Like an "honest accountant"?

  7. MrRtd
    Paris Hilton

    I don't think it is stupid to go private. Private companies have way more control, and not at the mercy of volatile markets. The stock market is nothing more than a casino, where so-called investors aren't interested in long term growth but focused on short term gains. A private company with good management, decent assets, can be very successful and profitable for the the owners.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      The also don't have to run the gauntlet of being sued by litigious stock-holding corporations the moment they appear to have done anything not demonstrably beneficial to said corporations' "interest" in the company (i.e. short term avarice)

      1. dogged

        Sure they do, if one of those litigious corporations is one of the private equity suppliers that funded the buy-back.

  8. Rupert Stubbs
    FAIL

    Hubris, eh?

    May I be the first to regurgitate Michael Dell's infamous comment about Apple "I'd sell it and give the money back to the shareholders"?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Hubris, eh?

      Well, on the latest news of limp iPhone 5 sales and the immediate drop in stock value ...... perhaps there is more hubris about elsewhere, also.

  9. The Godfather
    Happy

    When you're public and faced with pressure to increase share value and volume, it does you no favours to find your market suppressed or where what you generally manufacture, produce and sell, no longer provides either, options are limited. It has made gains in changing its focus and may have eyes set on being a considerably different business moving forward. Generating 4bn of profit on 50bn of sales and with no worries of share value or market capitalization sounds just perfect for a private company. Drops in revenue are a killer to publicly quoted companies - period.

  10. greedywaterrabbitt
    Happy

    Should fix the stock mkt like horse racing -i.e. bet on the horses w/o killing them!

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