Dell's dog days of summer
Once again, the world's largest PC maker reports disappointing financial news, its plans for growth stymied by a decline at its core.
By Tom Krazit
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
Published: July 21, 2006, 2:30 PM PDT
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news analysis Perhaps the only thing hotter than Austin, Texas, in mid-July is the pressure now on Dell executives after another poor quarter.
Dell on Friday again disappointed its investors, warning that both revenue and profit would be below expectations for its second fiscal quarter. Analysts polled by Thomson First Call had been expecting $14.2 billion in revenue and earnings of 32 cents per share. But Dell now expects to record $14 billion in revenue and only 21 cents to 23 cents per share in earnings, a solid dime off expectations.
High ImpactWhat's new:
Dell's financial performance continues to suffer as the company announces it will fall far short of its earnings targets.
Bottom line:
Dell has noted several areas for improvement, but it will take some time, and likely some more pain, before things turn around.
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What's gone wrong with the PC industry's low-cost wonder? To start, analysts wonder if Dell's costs are on the rise. Also, after years of wowing investors and the PC-buying public with its online sales and marketing, the resurgence of the retail market in PCs is hurting the company just as its corporate customers ease back on purchases, according to analysts.
Dell executives worship at the altar of the direct-sales model. For almost 20 years, Dell has used mail-order, telephone and the Internet to avoid the channel and inventory problems that can be a painful part of life for retail businesses. Even though it wasn't always true, Dell also managed to create an impression that it was a price leader, when its real advantage was that its costs were lower than retail-heavy companies like Hewlett-Packard and Gateway.
And that's still the message from the company with the leading market share in the PC industry. "The direct model remains our not-so-secret weapon," Chief Executive Officer Kevin Rollins told shareholders Friday.
Over the last few years, consumers have become the driving force behind the PC market, and more often than not they want to buy systems from retailers, said Samir Bhavnani, an analyst with Current Analysis.
The U.S. retail PC market is growing at a 25 percent clip, Bhavnani said, much faster than the 9 percent growth rate of the overall market. Dell is missing out on this category and companies like HP, Gateway and Acer are benefiting, he said.
But this is also coming at a time when the main part of Dell's business, the commercial PC market, has decided to take a break from buying new systems. Dell says 85 percent of its business comes from commercial entities, and those organizations buy PCs in upgrade cycles, said Charles Smulders, an analyst with Gartner. The last cycle started around 2002, three or so years after companies started buying PCs ahead of the perceived Y2K problems. It's now coming to an end, and business customers aren't expected to upgrade again until they've done extensive testing of Microsoft's Windows Vista, which is scheduled to arrive in the first part of 2007. That would put the next upgrade cycle around 2008.
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