Dell's decision to go private (and Microsoft's $2B investment) are big news in the tech world today, but there's precious little in the way of hard evidence for why Michael Dell decided to buy back the company he founded as a college student back in 1984. The Microsoft angle has gotten a lot of press, but it's not the primary driver of the deal. Michael Dell clearly has some ideas about how he wants to refocus the company; Dell signed off on $5B in acquisitions in the past 12 months, and $13B in the past few years. All the major acquisitions have been enterprise companies; he's clearly preparing the company to take on HP and IBM in lucrative segments of their own markets. While it may not have the same requirements to shareholders now, Dell still needs to explain how it plans to reinvigorate its brands, leverage its new partnership with Microsoft, and invest in businesses...



Link: HotHardware