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Michael Dell Steps Down as CEO
A whole lot of readers made sure we knew that Michael Dell is calling it quits as CEO of Dell, and has named Kevin Rollins, the current president and chief operating officer of Dell, as his successor. Rollins will retain the title of president, but Michael Dell hasn't left completely. He's still planning on sticking around as chairman of the board.
Someone like Dell will not go quietly into night. Even though his title is changing, nobody believes that he still won't have a profound influence over the company. It is his baby. THis will most likely be like Gates and MS. Sure, his title is different than what it used to be but he certainly still has a tremendous influence.
No trees were harmed in the composition of this; however, numerous electrons were inconvenienced.
This is not a troll, really. I'm just surprised they said something sorta like "Michael will think about The Next Big Thing (tm)" when they are just a hyper-efficient marketing arm/merchandizing facade for Intel. "Dell and R&D" don't go together in my mind, contrary to "Apple and R&D" or "IBM and R&D". Dell is nothing more than a glorified Northgate (or Everex, whatever).
No, IMO, this does not jive. Either M. Dell has other objectives (politics, maybe, I dunno) or there was some sort of back-stage coup.
We all know who the puppetmaster is. You don't have to wear all the hats to still be the man behind the curtain. This doesn't surprise me, Dell's quality has suffered in recent months and it wouldn't surprise me if he was doing this to take some of the pressure off of himself.
I think this is actually a very wise move by Dell, because while this is a guy who started a business on his own and became extremely good at it, I would be surprised (I honestly don't know) if he was that business school MBA who can lead a company over the long run. Plus, if Rollins messes up, he can always blame the new CEO for all the problems.
That's probably not too far from the truth. At some point, I'd probably lose motivation if I had more money than I could possibly spend.
Hell, there are days now when I don't have much motivation, and I'm just a lowly mechanical engineer.
'I ain't a liar, baby, and I ain't proud I just want what I'm not allowed.' -- Violent Femmes, 36-24-36
Anyone know if the new guy is Linux-friendly?
I know Dell claims to be, and pretended to try Linux on consumer systems and gave up claiming "they weren't selling"... but that was because of the systems they chose to list Linux as an option with.
Just because we like an OS that _happens_ to be free (in both senses of the word), doesn't mean we're cheapskates!
How many Linux users do you know who would go out and buy the bottom-of-the-line of anything?
We go for the hotrods, bigger/better/faster/more.
I don't care if that monster notebook weighs 8.5#, I'm not a wimp, I want the power and rediculously-high resolution screen!
Actually - after reading an article on installing Linux on an I8600, I priced one - amazing how cheap you can get a 1920x1200 LCD notebook for these days.
Too bad it requires the MS-tax.
The 1st thing I'd do with it is shrink down the MS partition to as small as it goes (to keep it around to make the diag-drones happy) and install Linux on it. (just like I did with the notebook I'm typing this on, sadly only having 1400x1050 on the LCD).
- Preferences: Solaris 10 (servers), Ubuntu (desktops), Solaris 11 (personal servers) -
I'd think that the answer is obvious: Rollins will be Linux-friendly if he thinks it will make Dell more money and he won't if he doesn't.
One of the reforms suggested (i.e. not enforced by any code or law) by the SEC as a response to the enron/worldcom pseudo-scandal is that the job of CEO and chairman be split. Note that Disney just did this in the hopes of deflecting some dirt.
In the case of Dell: if your company is doing well but you want to split this job to make the Street happy, well, would you take the job that involves more work or the one that involves less? So the CEO job becomes more like a COO...and guess what? Rollins is the COO right now!
Like other posters I doubt this implies much change for Dell the company or Dell the man.
The Dell vision has been and continues to be to enter markets just before they reach commoditization and to rapidly scale up market share by undercutting on price.
Think they don't have R&D people? Think again -- they've got hundreds. But those hundreds are busy looking for the next market Dell can enter and dominate (think of how they entered the server market and, more recently, the PDA market).
Just because someone spends their R&D dollars on econometric models and market research rather than trying to invent truly new products doesn't mean they're not innovating. Dell taught an entire generation of successful companies how to analyze, parse, enter and dominate markets.
"It was a summer's tale: Just a boy, his Linux, and a head full of dreams..."
Mr. Dell is cashing out because he knows the PC market is TOAST!. PCs are such a commodity now days that Dell doesn't have an advantage anymore. Just look at the sub $200 PCs at Walmart! And with China and Korea quickly sucking up market share, it won't be long before you can nab a highend PC for $200.
I'm not saying this is bad. It's just that Mr. Dell is smart and KNOWS the market is about to crumble. In fact, Dell doesn't make anything anymore, they just rebrand the laptops made by Samsung. Soon, Samsung will cut out the middle man and sell the laptops themselves.
Also, you can forget about fixing and repairing PCs as job security. That goldmine has ran out. Why pay someone $100 just to patch up an older PC when you can get a new one for double that amount (and comes with warranty)?
Life is not for the lazy.
It was all the rage in the dot-bomb era, but as usually reality comes crashing back in, demonstrating that there really IS a reason businesses run the way they do. So kudos to MD, who went out on top, unlike Eisner who had to be forced out. But the difference between the two is that MD is looking out for his company, and Eisner is looking out for Eisner.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
The problem being that to do the job of chairman effectively you usually have to have been the ex-CEO. So michael Dell is only following the normal practice for a founder, giving up the day to day running of the business and keeping the long term governance position.
The dotcom startups were not really abberations here. There is not much point in having a chairman in a company that is only a few years old. if the management team are crooks or jerks then the truck is going to hit the wall and all the investors will lose their money in any case.
What was an abberation was when the long established companies started running themselves in this way. Michael Eisener did not create Disney, he should not have unfettered control. He should not be paid so much for such mediocre results.
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