Dell CEO Kevin Rollins resigns, replaced by founder Michael Dell

The Wall Street Journal (Excerpt) (Subscription required) ^ | January 31, 2007

[HAL9000]

BREAKING NEWS: Dell said its CEO Kevin Rollins has resigned and will be replaced by founder Michael Dell. Mr. Dell will remain the PC maker's chairman. Full article coming shortly.

[HAL9000]

Dumped!

[farlander]

Well if you take a look at the recent stock price performance... it's obvious why. Maybe I'll buy some DELL options tommorow, 3-6 months out...

[HAL9000]

Press release -

Michael Dell Assumes Duties as Chief Executive Officer of Dell Inc.

Wednesday January 31, 4:29 pm ET

Dell Will Remain as Chairman of Board

ROUND ROCK, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL - News) announced today that Michael Dell will assume the duties of Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. Mr. Dell, who will retain his duties as Chairman of the Board, will replace Kevin Rollins.

"The Board believes that Michael's vision and leadership are critical to building Dell's leadership in the technology industry for the long term," said Samuel A. Nunn, presiding director of Dell's Board. "There is no better person in the world to run Dell at this time than the man who created the Direct Model and who has built this company over the last 23 years."

Michael Dell founded the company in 1984 with $1,000 and an unprecedented idea - to bypass the middleman and sell computer systems directly to the customer. He has served as the company's Chairman of the Board, since its founding, and served as CEO until 2004.

"Dell has tremendous opportunities ahead of it," said Mr. Dell. "I am enthusiastic about Dell 2.0, which includes our plan to provide the best customer experience, build a strong global services business and ensure our products deliver the best long-term customer value."

Mr. Rollins has resigned, effective immediately, from his position as CEO and as a member of the Board of Directors.

"Kevin has been a great business partner and friend," said Mr. Dell. "He has made significant contributions to our business over the past 10 years. I wish him much success in the future."

In 1992, Mr. Dell became the youngest CEO ever of a Fortune 500 company. Mr. Dell serves on the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum, the executive committee of the International Business Council and is a member of the U.S. Business Council.

The Company also said that it expects its fourth quarter Fiscal Year 2007 results to be below the average of First Call estimates for both revenue and earnings per share.

[DarthVader]

Their customer and technical service from India has been the cause of their poor performance. Thats the info I got from my broker when I sold my shares two years ago.

[reagan_fanatic]

Dude - you're getting canned!

[massgopguy]

Stop installing Java VM on your machines. I have to spend a half hour or more deleting all of its components to install a PCI card to run multiple printers when I set up a customer system.

[The South Texan]

"Their customer and technical service from India has been the cause of their poor performance. Thats the info I got from my broker when I sold my shares two years ago."

That's exactly why I bought a different brand last year when I replaced my desktop.

[HAL9000]

WSJ says Dell warns revenue and EPS will fall short of estimates.

[babaloo]

Sounds like a buying opportunity for the stock and the computers.

[DarthVader]

I got over $300 dollars in credits because of customer service incompetence. (Got an Axim handheld for nothing basically.) It is really bad and these people are not capable of performing the simplest task without screwing it up. I performed a SWOT analysis on Dell in grad school and the results of it have proven to be pretty accurate.

[relictele]

Hello, dis is Sandeep. Can I have you-are e-mail address pliz?

---

Dear Mike: Welcome back - not that you went anywhere. Remember your days as a Young Turk? Remember your days as an innvator both in terms of product and pricing? Remember when the old guard couldn't hold a candle to Dell in value, quality and support?

Now we admit that it's a bit tough to commiserate with your end-users after spending half the day in the private banking suite at Round Rock National, but we don't begrudge you the cash - you earned it. We just want you to act like Michael Dell and not like William Ford in steering the company that bears your name.

Building the PCs and servers overseas may be a necessary evil but the practice of giving support contracts to know-nothing call-centers owned by charlatans flying back and forth between Bangalore and Texas has to stop. You know the backlash you got on the server end and we appreciate your willingness to capitulate. Now the desktop market deserves the same courtesy. Stop patching us through to the third world with its Pidgin English and automated advice to "look on Dell's web site." We've already looked at the bleedin' web site for hours now, thanks, but our graphics adapter is fried and we are under warranty. Waiting in a phone queue only to have to provide the same information over and over again is pointless for both of us. We fulfilled our obligation - we paid for and use the product faithfull - now fulfill yours and countenance the fact that service after the sale is vital - especially when your QA has slipped drastically in the past few years.

PS - dropping your standard (read: free) parts & labor warranty from 3 years to 1 year was clever. Kudos to the marketing department and bean-counters. You know full well that most hardware failure occurs about 1.5 years after initial sale so this is either a money-maker for you or a money-saver since so many people will throw up their hands and simply buy a new PC. I know you're hoping that the new PC will be a Dell but you're in charge, so give us something more than hope to go on.

I've included a rough edit of a book I'm working on: "The Rapid Rise and Laborious Fall of Gateway Computer." You may find a few helpful hints inside.

Your pal, IT Consultant Guy

[reagandemo]

Yep I replaced my Dell with an HP because I could not understand what the heck the support guy was saying when I had a problem. Lousy customer support = lost business.

[Arizona Carolyn]

Not just Dell... HP, too are not the quality companies they used to be.

[Rb ver. 2.0]

[Alberta's Child]

Just goes to show you that you really do get what you pay for.

[Arizona Carolyn]

HP uses India for CS as well... I'm not sure what you gained. I have three HP printers and PC.... one of the printers is an all-in-one.. the first didn't work right out of the box, on the replacement the printer only worked correctly for six months before it would start printing sideways on anything other than one page. Tried to work it out with India, finally gave up and bought another printer. I've used HP for years and years, but having to deal with India is really testing my patience.

[DarthVader]

True, Lots of companies have outsourced and have brought inferior quality service to keep operating costs low. I would pay more to have better service like they had when I bought my first Dell in 1997.

[Proud_USA_Republican]

Dude - you're getting a multi-million dollar golden parachute!

[HAL9000]

Dell is getting hammered by their competitors - especially H-P. The delay of Windows Vista sealed the doom of Kevin Rollins.

But customers will not buy more Dell computers just because Michael Dell has returned. I think the big question is - will Dell change their business model? Will they stop selling low-end computers at below cost and sacrifice some economies of scale and marketshare in order to improve their profitability? Will they actually try to innovate something, like Apple does every day?

[DarthVader]

How about when they try to use American sounding names?