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Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

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Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#51
post #24
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the idea is to get into the private cloud business, in hope that it will grow ?

Exactly. AFAIK Amazon is the only company that has a profitable public cloud atm. Dell/EMC are mostly B2B companies and setting up and managing private clouds is the next gold mine.

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Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#52
post #27

The new company services 98% of all fortune 500 companies. That's a pretty incredible reach. And 140,000 employee's. If I were a betting main, I'd expect that number to drop in the very near term. Selfishly I'm very interested in following a private Dell,as tech tends to lead to huge companies in monopoly/winner take all verticals. Dell being private is a decent case study to see how well a private company does again…

> The tracking stock, DVMT, that EMC owners were given has traded pretty well since it was released, it's slightly up, so atleast people who want out of the new entity have an easy avenue. It's trading at a 35% discount from VMW, which is pretty steep.

I tried to buy DVMT and couldn't get any.

Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#53
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The tracking stock, DVMT, that EMC owners were given has traded pretty well since it was released, it's slightly up, so atleast people who want out of the new entity have an easy avenue. It's trading at a 35% discount from VMW, which is pretty steep.

> It's trading at a 35% discount from VMW, which is pretty steep. Sure is, but keep a few things in mind.. 1) This is the first time tracking stock has been issued on a public company so there are alot of people out there who aren't really sure what to make of this class instrument yet. 2) You'd expect a steep discount due to liquidity and lack of typical share holder rights. For example, if VMWare did pay a dividend…

> 1) This is the first time tracking stock has been issued on a public company so there are alot of people out there who aren't really sure what to make of this class instrument yet.

I don't think it's the first time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracking_stock has some examples (although I don't know if those are public companies). I thought I had heard of other examples in the articles about the deal.

> 2) You'd expect a steep discount due to liquidity and lack of typical share holder rights. For example, if VMWare did pay a dividend, then the tracking stock would not necessarily have to pay that out to unit holders.

Sort of. The tracking stock is non-voting, but I'm not sure how much that matters. (You'd expect a small discount for that.) VMware doesn't have a dividend now, so I don't think that should influence the tracking stock price much.

> 3) EMC paid a dividend. There are alot of funds that bought EMC to get the dividend. They've been forced to sell the tracking stock as VMWare doesn't pay a dividend and the tracking stock won't pay one.

Sure, but theoretically VMW shareholders (anyone who thinks VMW is a buy or hold) should be incentivized to buy a bunch of cheap DVMT, propping the price up relatively close to VMW. Why do VMW shareholders think VMW is worth ~$73 but DVMT isn't worth more than ~$46?

Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#56
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard the "insanely overpriced" comment before - compared to what? The open source/cheaper alternatives tend to be, bluntly, a joke when it comes to the data storage market. They all either have glaring availability or feature gaps that people who champion them try to paint as "not a big deal". It's not a big deal until your fortune 500 relies on it.

even compared to 3PAR or even NetApp they're crazy expensive

You don't buy them for when they work. You buy them for when it goes wrong. At that point EMC type firms will throw engineers at the problem and provide plenty of relationship managers to help you keep your job (sorry, assist in ensuring that your business relationship continues to be mutually beneficial).

No-one ever got fired for buying IBM.

Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#57
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's trading at a 35% discount from VMW, which is pretty steep. Sure is, but keep a few things in mind.. 1) This is the first time tracking stock has been issued on a public company so there are alot of people out there who aren't really sure what to make of this class instrument yet. 2) You'd expect a steep discount due to liquidity and lack of typical share holder rights. For example, if VMWare did pay a dividend…

> 1) This is the first time tracking stock has been issued on a public company so there are alot of people out there who aren't really sure what to make of this class instrument yet. I don't think it's the first time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracking_stock has some examples (although I don't know if those are public companies). I thought I had heard of other examples in the articles about the deal. > 2) You'd e…

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Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#58
I hope Dell does not screw up EMC Isilon, because Isilon is a big contributor to the FreeBSD project and it would suck to lose their contributions. The link below shows the over 3,000 commits they have made to the FreeBSD project over the years.

https://secure.freshbsd.org/search?project=freebsd&q=emc

Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#59
The Dell-EMC merger itself is fascinating, but really stands above it is all the other company's that EMC owns: VMWare, Spring, Pivotal, RSA Security, and a whole stable of backup/recovery companies.

All of these have deep inroads in the enterprise and really makes working on Dell-owned products opaque to the user. It's like Dell has become, or will soon become, the Koch Industries of the computing world.

Re: Dell Closes $60B Merger with EMC

#60
While I agree with the DOJ decision on the Halliburton-Baker Hughes acq. ( even though it may have cost me a job ( but probably not - they were headed full-on Luddite well before ) ) it's really interesting that the same logic does not apply when it's explicitly technology.

I wouldn't wish Dell on anyone - although they've done what's necessary to be the leader.

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