Michael Dell | |
---|---|
Born | Michael Saul Dell February 23, 1965 Houston, Texas, U.S. |
Alma mater | University of Texas at Austin (dropped out) |
Occupations |
|
Title |
|
Spouse | Susan Lynn Lieberman (m. 1989) |
Children | 4 |
Relatives | Adam Dell (brother) |
Michael Saul Dell (born February 23, 1965) is an American billionaire businessman and investor. He is the founder, chairman, and CEO of Dell Technologies, one of the world's largest technology infrastructure companies. [1]
He is the 10th-richest person in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index , with a net worth of $124 billion as of March 2024. [2] As of October 2023, according to Forbes, approximately $50 billion of his net worth was derived from his 50% stake in Dell and 40% stake in VMware, with the rest being held by his family office DFO Management. [3]
In January 2013 it was announced that he had bid to take Dell Inc. private for $24.4 billion in the biggest management buyout since the Great Recession. Dell Inc. officially went private in October 2013. [4] The company once again went public in December 2018. [5]
Dell was born in 1965 in Houston to a Jewish family. His parents were Lorraine Charlotte (née Langfan), a stockbroker, [6] and Alexander Dell, an orthodontist. Michael attended Herod Elementary School in Houston. [7] In a bid to enter business early, he applied to take a high school equivalency exam at age eight. [8] In his early teens, he invested his earnings from part-time jobs in stocks and precious metals. [9]
Dell purchased his first calculator at age seven and encountered an early teletype terminal in junior high. At age 15, after playing with computers at Radio Shack, he got his first computer, an Apple II, which he promptly disassembled to see how it worked. [10] Dell attended Memorial High School in Houston, selling subscriptions to the Houston Post in the summer. [11] Dell's parents wanted him to be a doctor and in order to please them, he took up pre-med at the University of Texas in 1983. [12] Dell continued learning to target specific populations for newspaper subscriptions rather than just making cold calls. [13] He discovered that people who were most likely to get a subscription were newlyweds and people moving to a new home. After collecting the contact information of this population from public records, he sent direct mail appeals and earned $18,000 in one year. [11] He hired several employees, and after earning a gross profit of nearly $200,000 in his first year of business, Dell dropped out of the University of Texas at age 19. [14]
While a freshman pre-med student at the University of Texas, Dell started an informal business putting together and selling upgrade kits for personal computers in Room 2713 of the Dobie Center residential building. [15] [16] He then applied for a vendor license to bid on contracts for the State of Texas, winning bids by not having the overhead of a computer store. [17] [18] [19]
In January 1984, Dell believed that the potential cost savings of a manufacturer selling PCs directly had enormous advantages over the conventional indirect retail channel. [20] In January 1984, Dell registered his company as "PC's Limited". Dell’s strategy was to sell directly to customers by manufacturing computers only after they were ordered. [21] Operating out of a condominium, the business sold between $50,000 and $80,000 worth of PC upgrades, kits, and add-on components. In May, Dell incorporated the company as "Dell Computer Corporation" and relocated to a business center in North Austin. The company employed a few people as order takers, a few more to fill the orders, and, as Dell recalled, a manufacturing staff consisting of "three guys with screwdrivers sitting at six-foot tables". The venture's capitalization cost was $1,000. [22] [23] During the formative years of Dell Computer, Dell was mentored by Morton Meyerson. [24]
In 1992, aged 27, he became the youngest CEO of a company ranked in Fortune magazine's list of the top 500 corporations. [25] In 1996, Dell started selling computers over the Web, the same year his company launched its first servers. By March 1997, Dell Inc. reported about $1 million in sales per day from dell.com. [26] [27] In the first quarter of 2001, Dell Inc. reached a world market share of 12.8 percent, surpassing Compaq to become the world's largest PC maker. The metric marked the first time the rankings had shifted over the previous seven years. The company's combined shipments of desktops, notebooks and servers grew 34.3 percent worldwide and 30.7 percent in the United States at a time when competitors' sales were shrinking. [28]
On March 4, 2004, Dell stepped down as CEO, but stayed as chairman of Dell Inc.'s board, while Kevin Rollins, then president and COO, became president and CEO. On January 31, 2007, Dell returned as CEO at the request of the board, succeeding Rollins. [29]
In 2013, Michael Dell with the help of Silver Lake Partners, Microsoft, and a consortium of lenders took Dell, Inc. private. The deal was reportedly worth $25 billion and faced difficulties during its execution. Notable resistance came from Carl Icahn, but after several months he stepped aside. Michael Dell received a 75% stake in the company. [30]
On October 12, 2015, Dell Inc. announced its intent to acquire the enterprise software and storage company EMC Corporation. At $67 billion, it has been labeled the "highest-valued tech acquisition in history". [31] [32] The acquisition was finalized September 7, 2016. [33]
In July 2010 Dell Inc. agreed to pay a $100 million penalty to settle SEC charges [34] of disclosure and accounting fraud in relation to undisclosed payments from Intel Corporation. Michael Dell and former CEO Kevin Rollins agreed to pay $4 million each and former CFO James Schneider agreed to pay $3 million to settle the charges. [34]
Accolades for Dell include "Entrepreneur of the Year" (at age 24) from Inc. magazine; [35] "Top CEO in American Business" from Worth magazine; "CEO of the Year" from Financial World , IndustryWeek and Chief Executive magazines. Dell also received the 1998 Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement [36] and the 2013 Franklin Institute's Bower Award for Business Leadership. [37]
Dell serves on the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum, the executive committee of the International Business Council, the U.S. Business Council. He previously served as a member of the U.S. President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. [38]
In April 2020, Governor Greg Abbott named Dell to the Strike Force to Open Texas – a group "tasked with finding safe and effective ways to slowly reopen the state" during the COVID-19 pandemic. [39] He also serves as an advisor on the COVID-19 Technology Task Force, a technology industry coalition founded in March 2020 collaborating on solutions to respond to and recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. [40]
Dell's 1999 book, Direct from Dell: Strategies That Revolutionized an Industry (by HarperBusiness), is an account of his early life, his company's founding, growth and missteps, as well as lessons learned. The book was written in collaboration with Catherine Fredman. [41]
Dell's second book, Play Nice But Win: A CEO's Journey from Founder to Leader (by Portfolio), is a story of inside battles that defined him as a leader. The book was written in collaboration with James Kaplan. [42]
In 1998, Dell founded MSD Capital L.P., later renamed DFO Management, to manage his family's investments. [43]
In February 2018, it was reported that in 2014, Dell had paid $100.5 million for Manhattan's One57 penthouse, which was then a record for the most expensive home ever sold in the city. [44]
On March 1, 2024, Dell's net worth crossed the $100 billion mark, after Dell, Inc. reported an earnings beat, pushing the stock up 32% in the trading day and adding $13.7 billion into his fortune from $90.6 billion to $104.3 billion according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index , making him the 12th-richest person at that time. [45] [2] [46]
Dell married Susan Lieberman on October 28, 1989, in Austin, Texas; the couple reside there with their four children. [47]
In 1999, Michael and Susan Dell established the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, which focuses on causes related to health and education. [48] Dell is also behind the founding of the Dell Jewish Community Campus in the Northwest Hills neighborhood of Austin. [49] With his wife, Dell was the third-largest donor in America in 2023 with total giving of $975 million. Dell and his wife have been among the top three most generous donors in America previous in 2003 and 2017. [50]
Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered and incorporated in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Computer Company by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne, the company was incorporated by Jobs and Wozniak as Apple Computer, Inc. the following year. It was renamed Apple Inc. in 2007 as the company had expanded its focus from computers to consumer electronics. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue, with US$383.29 billion in 2023.
Compaq Computer Corporation was an American information technology company founded in 1982 that developed, sold, and supported computers and related products and services. Compaq produced some of the first IBM PC compatible computers, being the second company after Columbia Data Products to legally reverse engineer the BIOS of the IBM Personal Computer. It rose to become the largest supplier of PC systems during the 1990s. The company was initially based in Harris County, Texas.
Dell Inc. is an American technology company that develops, sells, repairs, and supports computers and related products and services. Dell is owned by its parent company, Dell Technologies.
Jeffrey Preston Bezos is an American business magnate and oligarch best known as the founder, executive chairman, and former president and CEO of Amazon, the world's largest e-commerce and cloud computing company. He is the second wealthiest person in the world, with a net worth of US$227 billion as of November 7, 2024, according to Forbes and Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He was the wealthiest person from 2017 to 2021, according to both the Bloomberg Billionaires Index and Forbes.
Donald J. Carty, is a Canadian-American businessman who is chairman of Porter Airlines. Carty also is a director of VMWare, Hawaiian Airlines and Betterez. He was previously chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of AMR Corporation, the parent company of American Airlines, from 1998 to 2003. He is the past Chairman of Virgin America and E-Rewards, Inc.. Carty is also a past director of Dell, CN Rail, Sears, Placer Dome, Barrick Gold, CHC Helicopters, Brinker International, Talisman Energy, EMC Corporation, and Gluskin Sheff. In January 2007, Carty became the vice chairman and chief financial officer of Dell. On June 13, 2008, Carty retired from day-to-day operations, but stayed on as a director. He is a past chairman of Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, a former member of the board of trustees of both Southern Methodist University and Queen's University and of the board of directors of the Dallas Center for the Performing Arts Foundation and the Dallas Theater Center. He is on the executive board of the SMU Cox School of Business.
Dell EMC is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, and Round Rock, Texas, United States. Dell EMC sells data storage, information security, virtualization, analytics, cloud computing and other products and services that enable organizations to store, manage, protect, and analyze data. Dell EMC's target markets include large companies and small- and medium-sized businesses across various vertical markets. The company's stock was added to the New York Stock Exchange on April 6, 1986, and was also listed on the S&P 500 index.
TPG Inc., previously known as Texas Pacific Group and TPG Capital, is an American private equity firm based in Fort Worth, Texas. TPG manages investment funds in growth capital, venture capital, public equity, and debt investments. The firm invests in a range of industries including consumer/retail, media and telecommunications, industrials, technology, travel, leisure, and health care. TPG became a public company in January 2022, trading on the NASDAQ under the ticker symbol “TPG”.
Michael J. Saylor is an American entrepreneur and business executive. He is the executive chairman and co-founder of MicroStrategy, a company that provides business intelligence, mobile software, and cloud-based services. Saylor was MicroStrategy's chief executive officer from 1989 to 2022; in 2000, Saylor was charged by the SEC with fraudulently reporting MicroStrategy's financial results for the preceding two years. He later reached a settlement with the SEC for $350,000 in penalties and $8.3 million in personal disgorgement. Saylor is a bitcoin advocate and under Saylor MicroStrategy has spent billions of dollars to purchase over a hundred-thousand bitcoin. In 2024, he paid a $40 million fine to settle a tax fraud suit. He authored the 2012 book The Mobile Wave: How Mobile Intelligence Will Change Everything. He is also the sole trustee of Saylor Academy, a provider of free online education.
Silver Lake, legally Silver Lake Technology Management, L.L.C., is an American global private equity firm focused on technology and technology-enabled investments. Silver Lake is headquartered in Silicon Valley and New York, and has offices in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
Kevin Barney Rollins is an American businessman and philanthropist. The former President and CEO of Dell Inc., in 2006 Rollins was named by London's CBR as the 9th Most Influential person in the Enterprise IT sector.
The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard or HP, was an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, California. HP developed and provided a wide variety of hardware components, as well as software and related services to consumers, small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), and fairly large companies, including customers in government, health, and education sectors. The company was founded in a one-car garage in Palo Alto by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939, and initially produced a line of electronic test and measurement equipment. The HP Garage at 367 Addison Avenue is now designated an official California Historical Landmark, and is marked with a plaque calling it the "Birthplace of 'Silicon Valley'".
NTT DATA Corporation is a Japanese multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is a partially-owned subsidiary of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT).
James W. Breyer is an American venture capitalist, founder and chief executive officer of Breyer Capital, an investment and venture philanthropy firm, and a former managing partner at Accel Partners, a venture capital firm. Breyer has invested in over 40 companies that have gone public or completed a merger, with some of these investments, including Facebook, earning over 100 times cost and many others over 25 times cost. On the Forbes 2021 list of the 400 richest Americans, he was ranked #389, with a net worth of US$2.9 billion.
Cloudera, Inc. is an American data lake software company.
Catherine "Cathie" A. Lesjak was the chief financial officer (CFO) of HP Inc. She became CFO of Hewlett‑Packard Company on January 1, 2007 and was the interim CEO from August 6, 2010 to November 1, 2010. During her tenure as interim CEO, HP paid a record 325 times EBITDA for 3PAR in a bidding war with Dell Computer. HP also paid 57 times EBITDA for ArcSight Inc. She served as Senior Vice President and Treasurer of Hewlett-Packard Company since June 2003. Lesjak served as a Director of Neoware Inc. since October 2007. Her salary for 2009 was $589,063.00.
Virtustream Inc. was a provider of cloud computing management software, infrastructure as a service ("IaaS") and managed services to enterprises, governments and service providers. It was a subsidiary of Dell Technologies.
DFO Management, LLC is an American family office that manages the capital of Michael Dell and his family. The firm, which is based in New York City and has offices in Santa Monica and West Palm Beach, was formed in 1998.
International Business Machines Corporation, nicknamed Big Blue, is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York and present in over 175 countries. IBM is the largest industrial research organization in the world, with 19 research facilities across a dozen countries, having held the record for most annual U.S. patents generated by a business for 29 consecutive years from 1993 to 2021.
Dell Technologies Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Round Rock, Texas. It was formed as a result of the September 2016 merger of Dell and EMC Corporation.
Morton Herbert Meyerson is an American computer industry executive who held positions in the Ross Perot-founded Electronic Data Systems and subsequently at Perot Systems and General Motors. Ross Perot paid $10 million for naming rights to Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, home to the Dallas Symphony Orchestra.